DURBAN, July 19 (Reuters): Finance chiefs from the Group of 20 countries stressed the importance of central bank independence while pledging to boost cooperation in a communique they issued on Friday after a two-day meeting in South Africa.
In their first communique since last October, a month before U.S. President Donald Trump's election victory paved the way for his subsequent tariff war, the ministers and central bankers highlighted the uncertainty in the global economy caused by conflict, trade tensions and frequent extreme weather events.
The issue of central bank independence had hung heavily over the meeting in South Africa's coastal city of Durban following Trump's repeated berating of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell for not cutting interest rates, attacks that have roiled global financial markets.
"The significance of this motherhood and apple pie communique is that it exists at all, though its sprawling nature once again underscores the need for thorough G20 streamlining," said Mark Sobel, a former senior Treasury official and now US chairman of the Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum. "Its strong and welcome defence of central bank independence stood out, given President Trump's misguided attacks on Chair Powell," he said.
The communique was reached in the absence of U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent from the two-day meeting, though Washington was represented by Michael Kaplan, acting under secretary of the Treasury for international affairs.
Bessent also skipped the previous G20 finance chiefs' gathering in Cape Town in February, although Washington is due to assume the G20's rotating presidency in December.
"Central banks are strongly committed to ensuring price stability, consistent with their respective mandates, and will continue to adjust their policies in a data-dependent manner. Central bank independence is crucial to achieving this goal," the communique said.
South Africa's deputy finance minister David Masondo told reporters that the meeting outcomes contained in the communique were "consented to by all members" and centred on "strategic macroeconomic issues".
