IMF chief thanks Poland for loan pledge to eurozone firewall

“I warmly welcome today’s commitment by the Polish authorities to contribute in additional financing to the IMF,” Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said.

Lagarde's statement was released in the lead-up to this Friday's G20 summit in Washington.

“This is part of a concerted action among important creditors to ensure the Fund has sufficient resources to tackle crises and to promote global economic stability,” she continued.

“This commitment demonstrates Poland’s willingness to support the cooperative effort under way to strengthen global economic and financial stability in the spirit of multi-lateralism.”

Poland has contributed to the scheme though it has yet to become a member of the eurozone. The Polish government says it still intends to adopt the European single currency but not under present conditions.

Lagarde also welcomed a contribution from Switzerland to the tune of 26 billion US dollars.

Noting that she had received “firm indications of support from several other countries,” she added that “these countries will formalize their individual commitments in the coming days.

“This brings to about 320 billion USD the commitments received so far. I am, or course, very encouraged by this strong demonstration of support for the Fund, and I look forward to further commitments from our broader membership,” she concluded.

The EU has pledged it will provide 200 billion USD to the IMF and Japan pledged 60 billion US dollars.

The IMF has raised its global growth forecast for 2012 and 2013 on Tuesday to 0.2 percent than originally predicted in January and now says growth for this year will be 3.5 percent and 4.1 percent next.

The institution warned however that due to the eurozone's continuing crisis, economic conditions remained "very fragile” however. (pg/nh)