Ajay Banga Confirmed as World Bank Leader
Ajay Banga Confirmed as World Bank Leader - The New York Times
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Ajay Banga Confirmed as World Bank Leader
Mr. Banga’s appointment to a five-year term was confirmed on Wednesday by the World Bank.
Reporting from Washington
Ajay Banga, President Biden’s pick to be president of the World Bank and broaden its ambitions to combat climate change, was approved by its executive board on Wednesday.
Mr. Banga will assume the job on June 2 and succeed David Malpass, who was nominated by former President Donald J. Trump and has served in the job for four years. A former chief executive of Mastercard who was raised in India, the incoming president will bring deep experience with developing economies and financial expertise to a global institution facing a critical moment of transition.
The approval by the bank’s board of 25 executive directors was not unanimous. Russia, which has been largely isolated in international forums since its invasion of Ukraine, abstained. Russia signaled in March that it was trying to find an alternate candidate, but ultimately Mr. Banga was the only nominee put forward.
The World Bank president is traditionally an American citizen who is chosen by the United States, while the managing director of the International Monetary Fund is chosen by the European Union.
Mr. Banga will face high expectations and urgent questions about whether the bank will change its lending model, whether it will seek more money from shareholders and how it should address issues including poverty, global warming and the war in Ukraine. He will also face a challenging diplomatic environment, trying to satisfy the climate ambitions of the United States while maintaining the bank’s focus on development. And he will have to navigate a delicate relationship with China, a major shareholder and creditor that has been facing international pressure to allow poor countries to restructure their debts.
The leadership changes comes at a fraught time for the global economy, which has been gripped by a pandemic, inflation and war in the last three years. Those colliding crises have sent millions of people into poverty and reversed decades of development progress.
The bank’s backing of Mr. Banga, who was tapped by Mr. Biden in February, followed an extensive listening tour that included visits to eight countries and dozens of meeting with government officials around the world.
Mr. Banga is being appointed to serve a five-year term. His predecessor, Mr. Malpass, announced earlier this year that he would be stepping down early following criticism that he was not sufficiently committed to revamping the World Bank’s climate agenda.
Related Knowledge Center: Climate economics
Climate change is now a driver of the world’s economy. The impact is profound:
- Catastrophic weather events — hurricanes, floods, droughts, high temperatures — are more frequent and more extreme. The cost can be measured in both the initial damage caused and the longer-term impact on the economy.
- Vulnerable communities are increasing climate-related investments, hardening infrastructure and taking other protective measures.
- Investment in carbon capture and storage technologies is increasingly rapidly.
- Governments are making investments and crafting regulations to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
On top of all of this is the cost of uncertainty. As the Fourth National Climate Assessment, released in 2018 by the U.S. Global Change Research Program, says, “The assumption that current and future climate conditions will resemble the recent past is no longer valid.”