This means that we, together with the Ministry of Finance in the Government Offices, coordinate and conduct Swedish policy in this forum. This evening, I am intending to talk about globalisation - as an opportunity and a challenge. I am going to discuss what the International Monetary Fund is and the role that it has in an increasingly globalised world. To conclude, I will take up Sweden’s participation in the IMF, and what we can expect from the meetings in Prague next week. Globalisation and its benefits Before commenting on critical remarks often presented on globalisation, let me first begin by noting that prosperity in the world has improved dramatically during the past decades. Never before in history has the situation of so many people improved so much so quickly. Since the beginning of the 1980s, purchasing power per capita in the world has more than doubled. In the poor developing countries, this has meant that purchasing power correlated GDP per capita has increased by almost 350%. In the rich industrialised countries, the corresponding growth was 220%. In certain cases, developments have been particularly spectacular, not least in Asia. In 1975, six out of ten Asians lived in absolute poverty - under a dollar a day. Today, the figure is two out of ten. In China alone, the number of poor has fallen from 60 to just under 30% in less than twenty years. There are many factors that explain this development.
In Sweden this usually takes place in the early summer and the delegation stays for a week and visits during this period the Riksbank, the Ministry of Finance, Finansinspektionen [the Swedish financial supervisory authority], the social partners and other central economic participants to obtain a picture of the economic state of the country. This leads to a report that is discussed in the IMF board. In some cases, the IMF has a very practical involvement in countries. Many central banks in developing countries have been established with the assistance of the IMF. An example that is close to hand is the establishment of a central bank in Kosovo. The same applies to introductions of new currencies, or the introduction of new exchange rate regimes. The IMF also trains officials from national central banks and ministries of finance as part of the work of spreading knowledge. BIS Review 78/2000  4  An increasingly important part of its activity concerns creating common rules of play within different areas that affect financial stability. Many of these are in the form of general minimum standards and recommendations, for instance, in bank supervision, financial statistics, transparency and foreign exchange reserve management. By encouraging countries to meet these, countries reinforce their institutional framework, at the same time as increased standardisation makes it easier for everyone to be cognisant of systems in different countries. Not least, this assists investors to make risk assessments.