Leading international finance organizations have announced a new strategy for tackling corruption, reports the World Bank press review Tuesday.
The World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other organizations which provide loans, grants and advice to developing nations have signed up. They have agreed to share information and set up a task force to create a “uniform framework for preventing and combating fraud and corruption.”
Corruption is rising in most countries, according to a recent survey. People in 48 out of the 69 countries covered in Transparency Internationals annual Global Corruption Barometer survey said corruption had risen over the past three years.
The group of lenders, which includes the African Development Bank, the Asian Development Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, said they would work together to create proposals that could help countries strengthen their ability to combat corruption.
The World Bank has described corruption as the “single greatest obstacle to economic and social development.” It believes that countries that tackle corruption successfully can increase their national income fourfold and reduce child mortality by up to 75 percent.
Research it conducted in 2004 led it to estimate that 1 trillion US dollar was paid in bribes in 2003, compared to a global economy worth 30 trillion. The figure did not include embezzlement of public funds or theft of public assets.
The Transparency International survey showed that taking bribes was particularly prevalent in Africa, with Cameroon, Ghana and Nigeria the worst. Households in these three countries spend more than 20 percent of their income on paying bribes, it found. The Kenyan government was also hit by a recent corruption scandal.
The banks want to involve civil society organizations, the press and the judiciary in their efforts to combat corruption, the statement said.
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz has made the fight against corruption one of its primary policy goals. A number of African countries have already been punished because they did not take Wolfowitzs fight against corruption seriously. The World Bank, for instance, recently suspended loans to Chad, among others.
Kilde: www.worldbank.org
