Washington, United States, 13 October 2022 – The 4^th meeting of G20 Ministers of Finance and Central bank Governors (FMCBG) convened on the sidelines of the 2022 International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank Group Meetings in Washington on 12-13 October.

Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) President and Group Chairman, H.E. Dr. Muhammad Al Jasser, attended the session on Global Economy on 12 October and the session on Sustainable Finance on 13 October.

In his interventions at the session on global economy, Dr. Al Jasser explained enumerated the health, geo-political, and environmental crises that the world is going through and highlighted how the Islamic Development Bank Group has been reacting to them. “We continue to implement our US$4.5 billion special program addressing COVID-19 recovery and in parallel have developed a US$10.5 billion Food Security Response Program which aims to cover the costs of food and fertilizers imports in the short run while supporting the Bank’s member countries tackle the structural drivers of food insecurity in the long run. We have also contributed to the US$10 billion Arab Coordination Group’s initiative for Food Security Action,” he stated. He then urged for urgent and collective action by G20 to tackle the food security concerns.

Speaking to the participants at the session on sustainable finance, the IsDB Group Chairman referred to the world economic and financial slowdown that poses a serious threat to global development financing underlining the urgency for all relevant stakeholders to scale up sustainable financing which is crucial to support sustainable recovery and drive green economic growth. In line with SDGs and the outcomes of the Paris Agreement.  

He said: “IsDB commends the formidable efforts of the G20 presidency towards developing the necessary infrastructure and policy frameworks for sustainable finance-oriented markets. We applaud the efforts of the Sustainable Finance Working group and fully support the progress of its Roadmap and the related online dashboard and repository. We also value the remarkable success of the Development Working Group in formulating and adopting the G20 Principles to scale up blended finance in developing countries.”

The IsDB President then elaborated on how IsDB has been committed to promoting Islamic financing tools to scale up innovative, sustainable finance by issuing US$5 billion worth of Sukuk to mobilize green and sustainability-linked finance. “We encourage G20 stakeholders to leverage the success of Green and Sustainability Sukuk and promote them as innovative financing instruments. Regulatory support is needed to allow more Sukuk issuances that can ultimately help in scaling up sustainable finance globally,” he noted.