Yesterday, the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, the Honourable Chrystia Freeland, concluded a visit to Marrakech, Morocco for meetings of G7 and G20 Finance Ministers and the Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank.
The Deputy Prime Minister discussed with Canada's allies and partners the importance of building clean economies that deliver for working people, securing our essential supply chains, and ensuring that governments around the world do their part so that global inflation can continue to fall and prices can stabilize.
The Deputy Prime Minister held productive bilateral meetings with Janet Yellen, the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury; Jerome Powell, Chair of the Board of Governors of the U.S. Federal Reserve; Jeremy Hunt, the U.K.'s Chancellor of the Exchequer; Elisabeth Svantesson, Sweden's Minister of Finance; Sergii Marchenko, Ukraine's Minister of Finance; Christian Lindner, Germany's Federal Finance Minister; Gintarė Skaistė, Lithuania's Minister of Finance; and Paschal Donohoe, President of the Eurogroup and Ireland's Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery, and Reform.
While in Marrakech, the Deputy Prime Minister announced:
- $15 million to the IMF's Caribbean Regional Technical Assistance Centre (CARTAC), which will enable its next phase of work supporting Canada's IMF and World Bank constituency members.
- $5 million to Japan's Resilient and Inclusive Supply-chain Enhancement (RISE) Partnership in partnership with the World Bank, which will help accelerate clean economic growth in low- and middle-income countries and increase our shared clean energy and critical minerals supply chains.
- That in order to help provide relief to developing countries experiencing climate crises and natural disasters, Canada will now offer Climate Resilient Debt Clauses (CRDCs) in all new sovereign lending.
- A 700 million Special Drawing Rights (SDR) contribution, representing about $1.3 billion, to the IMF's Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust, as first announced by the Prime Minister at the UN, to provide concessional financing to low-income countries.
Together with G7 partners, the Deputy Prime Minister reiterated Canada's steadfast support for the State of Israel and unequivocal condemnation of Hamas. G7 Finance Ministers were joined by Ukraine's Minister of Finance, Sergii Marchenko. At the G7, they spoke about exploring all possible avenues to aid Ukraine, consistent with our respective legal systems and international law.
