Stimulus measures to stay for now

ST ANDREWS — Finance officials from rich and developing countries pledged on Saturday to maintain emergency support for their economies until recovery was assured, but failed to reach a clear agreement on bearing the cost of fighting climate change.

The grouping — representing about 90% of the world’s wealth, 80% of world trade and two-thirds of the world’s population — said after talks in St Andrews that economic recovery was “uneven and remains dependent on policy support”.

US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said US jobs figures out on Friday “reinforced that this is still a very tough economic environment”. They showed US unemployment at a 26-year high of 10,2%.

While the “process of growth is now beginning”, that fledging growth still needed to be reinforced to create jobs and get businesses investing to underpin the recovery in the housing market and elsewhere, Geithner said.

On climate change, the Group of Twenty officials also said they wanted “an ambitious outcome” at a major United Nations conference in Copenhagen next month — but did not commit to a funding package to help poorer states adapt to a warming climate. Europe has promoted a global climate fund of €100bn a year by 2020 — of government and private finance — as an incentive for poor states to agree to tight curbs on greenhouse gas emissions. Sapa-AP