G8/G20 leaders urged to have new policies for economic recovery

OTTAWA - Meeting ahead of the G8 and G20 summits here in June, heads of business chambers from the G8 industrialised nations urged their leaders to institute new polices to sustain recovery from the global economic meltdown.

The leaders of the largest business associations in the G8 nations Wednesday released the ‘G8 Business Declaration’ as their input for the G8/G20 summits. They called on the G8 and G20 governments to implement coordinated policies to restore confidence in global markets.

To sustain recovery, they said, the world leaders must put their own fiscal houses in order and reform the global financial framework.

“The decisions made at the G8 and G20 summits will have an impact on every Canadian,” said Shauneen Bruder, chairman of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce.

“The ability of our political leaders to make the right choices depends on the business community’s input,” he said.

Separately, the G8 business leaders said increased international trade was the only way for sustainable growth in both the developed and developing world.

The world needed to move from empty commitments to completion of the WTO Doha Round, they said.

“Action on the WTO along with removing protectionist barriers; a sound investment environment; and protection of intellectual property can provide the needed business environment for the recovery to fully take hold and businesses, and jobs, to flourish,” they said in the statement.

On global warming, they said: “We draw attention to our united stand that an international agreement is needed for achieving targets for greenhouse gas emissions and business certainty.”

Heads of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, the Confederation of British Industry, Confindustria from Italy, the Federation of German Industries, Mouvement des Entreprises de France, Nippon Keidanren from Japan, the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, the US Chamber of Commerce and BUSINESSEUROPE from EU participated in the meeting.