李月芬：我曾告诫一些非洲国家，大量借款时要小心

从银行破产到债务危机，美国国内正被自己混乱的经济政策反噬。

令人遗憾的是，大多数相关报道都专注于这些危机对发达国家的影响。然而，如果发生全球性的经济或金融危机，最受影响的可能是缺乏应对资源的发展中国家。

近日，南方中心南南合作和发展融资高级顾问李月芬在瑞士接受观察者网专访时，也谈到了上述问题。李月芬曾担任联合国外债与人权问题独立专家，并在联合国贸易和发展会议工作了24年以上。

她认为，发展中国家应该采取资本管制措施，以应对西方国家加息造成的发展中国家资本外流。此外，她还分享了自己对当前工作、发展融资、债务问题、债务陷阱等问题的看法。

观察者网采访李月芬

以下为采访实录：

【采访、翻译/观察者网 李泽西】

观察者网：您目前担任南南合作和发展融资高级顾问，这项工作最大的挑战是什么？

**李月芬：**我的工作重点在研究和分析上，主要关注世界上发展中国家的最新进展，特别是发展中国家在南南合作、经济发展、发展融资领域面临的挑战。我们会编写研究报告、政策简报，并向驻日内瓦和纽约的各国代表团介绍一些最新情况。这是研究和分析部分。

我们还向驻日内瓦和纽约的外交使团提供咨询服务，协助他们在贸易、金融、发展领域以及在世贸组织、联合国贸易和发展会议、世界卫生组织、世界知识产权组织、人权等各种机构的谈判，不过主要是在日内瓦。有时一些国家会就国内遇到的一些挑战或者政策战略想法咨询我们的意见。这就是咨询服务和谈判部分。

我们还承包技术援助项目。例如，我们协助了一个成员国建立南南合作和三角合作机构。这是一个相当复杂的过程，需要做可行性研究，分析该国当前部门架构、该国在南南合作和三角合作方面的弱点和缺口。建立新机构时，还需要考虑其与现有机构和部门将如何衔接，考虑体制架构、法律、监管等方面的问题。这是一次复杂的技术援助项目。

2019年，李月芬在联合国南南合作和三角合作分论坛致辞（图源：南方中心）

为了开展这些项目，我们经常与其他机构合作，如地区发展银行和联合国体系机构，去年我们还与粮食和农业组织合作实施了一个项目。我们正在进行不同类型的项目，有些可能很短，例如一次性的研讨会，有些可能需要耗费数年。

观察者网：您提到了发展融资，我们知道发展中国家目前面临的一个很大问题是资金不足。融资对于发展有多重要？发展中国家有哪些拓展融资的方式？

**李月芬：**毫无疑问，发展融资对发展中国家来说是极其重要的。对发展中国家来说，过去和未来都会有很大的资金缺口，具体大小众说纷纭，有人认为发展中国家若想完成2030年可持续发展目标，每年需要一万亿美元，这个缺口是顽固且巨大的。对于发展中国家来说，要想通过自然经济增长来创造所需资本是非常困难的，需要很长的时间，可能极大地推迟追赶发达国家的进程。

过去，一些发展中国家依靠官方发展援助，现在依赖程度有所减少。官方发展援助金额波动较大、不稳定，还经常被挪用于其他用途。它虽被称为发展援助，但有时并没有真正被引导到发展上。

一些最不发达国家曾经非常依赖这种官方发展援助，来尽可能填补他们的资金缺口。但是现在有各种各样的“干扰”和转移。

例如，在俄乌冲突期间，发达国家将大量的官方发展援助用于安置来到本国的乌克兰难民，意味着一定程度上，官方发展援助在发达国家内部被用于实现地缘政治目的，为捐助国的外交政策服务，而不是直接用于发展中国家的经济发展。

2022年，乌克兰与波兰边境的难民（图源：欧盟）

从1996年起，我们有了重债穷国倡议（对一些发展中国家提供全面减债），后来主要发达债权国向国际金融机构提供资金，以减免多边债务。在这两个倡议实施后，主要发达捐助国开始大幅减少双边官方发展援助，一些国家还明确宣布自己不再是双边捐助国。

大约在同一时期，国际金融机构开始鼓励发展中国家进入国际资本市场。信用评级机构也开始给发展中国家更高的主权等级，金融机构开始承担更多的风险，甚至向没有信用评级的国家提供风险投资。

可以看到，发展中国家进入资本市场有推和拉的双向力量。一些缺乏资本但富有自然资源的最不发达经济体，例如一些非洲国家，也开始首次发行自己的主权债券，在国际资本市场上大量借款。我此前在联合国贸易和发展会议工作时，曾与一些非洲国家的财政部长会面。我告诫他们，大量借款时需要小心，需要考虑是否有能力偿还这笔债务。但当时布雷顿森林机构还在鼓励这些国家发展其金融市场，同时走向国际市场，所以很难阻止这种趋势，很多国家开始大量借款。

与此同时，一些发展中国家也开始在国内借款，积累了大量的国内债务。一些低收入国家的债务中，国内债务占比约50%左右。

新兴市场和发展中经济体债务走势（图源：世界银行）

观察者网：然而西方媒体上却经常炒作所谓的“中国债务陷阱”。中国外债的事实到底是什么样的？

**李月芬：**我在债务问题上工作了几十年，亲自目睹了这种舆论是如何被塑造出来的，以及如何被逐步被纠正的。

所谓“中国债务陷阱”的说法，主要是始于西方媒体对斯里兰卡汉班托塔港事件的曲解和误报。报道称中国接管了该港口99年，对全世界、尤其从事债务问题的人来说，这是一个不小的冲击。逐渐地，不少报道开始将其概括和定性为“中国利用债务手段夺取欠债国家的战略资产”。舆论中也出现这样的争议：中国是否一直在用债务手段服务其外交，为各国制造“债务陷阱”。

媒体的相关报道时常不符合实际情况。最近的两三年内，许多基于实证研究的可靠论文非常明确地表明，目前没有出现过中国接管或抢夺债务国资产的事例。斯里兰卡显然不是这样的情况，对他们来说，获取资金来填补他们的缺口是非常重要的。我也看到了其他国家的一些相关报道和文件，每一栏都指证没有所谓的“债务陷阱”，媒体报告是错误的。

像中国这样一个拥有不同贷款渠道——包括私人、双边和公共贷款的国家，很难有目的地、有组织地制造“债务陷阱”。我不认为中国有这样的能力，也没有读到中国关于“债务外交”的任何明确政策。

不过，中国对发展中国家的贷款形式还是有改进的余地。例如，许多开发银行、区域开发银行、甚至世界银行，面临一个大项目时，他们会进行非常详细的可行性研究，研究社会、文化、经济和生态——包括气候变化——因素。对中国来说，启动基础设施项目前，应该进行非常详细的可行性研究，研究各种因素，分析对象国家的收支情况以及GDP趋势，看该国是否有能力偿还项目等贷款所产生的债务。

这里面当然有改进的空间，比如提高透明度，但现在的讨论已经被地缘政治所影响。媒体的客观分析报道对于经济来说是极其重要的，尤其在涉及债务等问题时。我刚刚参加了世界银行的春季会议，可惜仍未看到足够的客观分析。相关讨论有时会受地缘政治因素干扰，这导致更为重要的问题如债务国际架构的改革，被忽视或缺乏足够重视。

汉班托塔港资料图

观察者网：发展中国家的很多问题往往是发达国家带来的。过去一年间，为了打击通货膨胀、防止金融泡沫，许多发达国家央行——尤其是美国——在迅速加息。这对发展中国家有什么影响？发展中国家可以做些什么来对冲任何不利影响？

**李月芬：**这对发展中国家来说是一个非常重要的问题。首先，我认为货币正常化（指打击通胀）是必要的。然而，经济大国应该更好地协调最近的快速加息进程，并与发展中国家进行沟通。快速加息对发展中国家的溢出效应是巨大的，当下，通货膨胀已经冲击了许多发展中国家，在一些国家达三位数，超过100%甚至200%。

与此同时，许多发展中国家经历了大规模货币贬值，意味着债务偿还成本一直在大幅增加。因此，很多发展中国家正面临着国际收支问题，财政状况也在迅速恶化，一些国家的外汇储备已完全耗尽了，例如斯里兰卡，更多国家的外汇储备也在急剧减少。

发展中国家的人民同时还因物价上涨受苦，贫困人口也在增加。通货膨胀触及许多穷人每天必须消费的产品，如粮食。因此，这是导致贫困加剧的一个主要原因。

2023年4月通胀率，委内瑞拉和津巴布韦超150%而未列入（图源：JJLiu112）

溢出效应是广泛且显著的，我认为这对发展中国家是一个很大的挑战，越来越多的国家也将面临债务违约问题，将无法偿还债务，不得不宣布主权债务破产。这将是一个全球系统性的挑战。

面对这种情况，发展中国家可以做什么？首先，经济基本盘好的国家遭受的损失较小，而经济基本盘薄弱的国家会陷入危机。对发展中国家来说，他们首先需要非常仔细地审视自己的财政状况。我不建议采取紧缩开支政策，因为人们已经在遭受巨大的痛苦。我认为他们应该尝试“先发制人”，在力所能及的范围内维持国家的金融稳定。

资本管制是他们可以尝试的一个手段。因为发达国家的加息，资本正在撤离发展中国家，回到了发达国家。只要有必要且可行，资本管制是发展中国家可以用来减少或缓解国家金融波动的一个措施。

当然，社会保障也很重要。只要财政状况允许，政府应该考虑如何为国内的弱势群体出台有针对性的社会服务。

在国际上，发展中国家应该团结起来，请求国际金融支持，例如由国际货币基金组织发行新的特别提款权，以及调动来自区域银行和私企的国际资源援助。在中央银行之间建立或扩大必要的资金互换线也很重要，以尽可能地缓解金融波动，因为对发展中国家来说，当前存在的银行互换线非常小。他们可以考虑各种措施，但需要“先发制人”来抵御即将到来的危机。

观察者网：部分因为加息，一些国际大银行遇到了重大困难，包括这里的瑞士信贷。您认为这将对发展中国家融资产生什么影响？发展中国家应该如何应对，以及如何防止本国出现类似银行危机？

**李月芬：**最近的银行倒闭事件对其他国家的一个重要启示是，银行应该受到良好的监管，应该保持透明。当银行把所有的鸡蛋放在一个篮子里的时候，却没有很好地管理风险，瑞士信贷和硅谷银行等银行应该对第三方风险始终保持清醒认识。

对硅谷银行来说，破产的一个重要原因是他们的资产期限不匹配，用短期存款来购买长期债券。利率上升时，就会出现挤兑银行的情况。适当的监管和适当的透明度，可以使当局甚至普通公民了解情况，对银行业和整个国家的金融业都非常重要。这是一个重要的教训。

硅谷银行3月10日宣布破产（图源：Getty）

此外，通过发达国家救助这两家银行的过程，我们也可以看到发展中国家面临的巨大挑战。美国每天互换线金额是巨大的，这两家银行在两三天内可以通过互换线筹集数千亿美元。我参加华盛顿春季会议期间，就有发展中国家代表提到这一点，美国可以在三天内筹集数千亿美元拯救银行，而发展中国家一旦面临财政困难，三年内都看不到进展。因此，我们可以看到发达国家与发展中国家资金情况的不对称性，显然差异巨大。

这是一个重要的问题，也表明了国际金融结构改革的必要性。我们显然需要增加发展中国家在国际金融结构决策过程中的声音，现在是提出这个问题的重要时机，因为很多发展中国家正面临着很多问题。密切监管银行业是非常重要的，这也为发展中国家敲响了警钟，让它们注意到可能发生在自己国内的类似问题。

观察者网：最近几周，“去美元化”的呼声似乎日益高涨。俄罗斯总统普京最近承诺在俄罗斯与全球南方大部分国家之间使用人民币结算。在访华期间，巴西总统卢拉公开质疑，“为什么全世界一定要用美元”。甚至法国也首次以人民币结算了液化天然气出售订单。您认为是什么在推动当前的“去美元化”？“去美元化”在短期内前景如何，中长期又如何？

**李月芬：**本国货币成为国际储备货币的国家往往享有巨大的好处，比如美元。但最近的情况表明，人们越来越意识到过去几十年的美元化有诸多问题，特别对发展中国家来说。

对其他国家来说，如果他们真的实施本国货币美元化，实际上就失去了控制货币政策的主权，而且是自己主动拱手让出的。当经济运行出现危机时，这是一个巨大的不利因素。

作为一名在金融领域工作的国际公务员，多年来我一直在讨论美元这个问题。当然，去美元化有很多挑战，我希望人们不要过度指望去美元化迅速发生，因为现在的国际贸易和银行部门的清算系统SWIFT，完全被美国所控制。当然，也有其他清算系统，但发挥的作用很小。清算系统是非常重要的，如果想要去美元化，但不能改变清算系统，去美元化就不会发生。

位于比利时布鲁塞尔总部的SWIFT徽标（图源：澎湃影像）

欧盟曾试图建立另一个清算系统——INSTEX，发展了好几年，一度取得了一定的进展，但是据我所了解，欧盟已经在2023年3月叫停了INSTEX，总之我没有看到任何进展。

此外，还需要建立其他金融基础设施，才能实现去美元化，这都需要时间。而最重要的因素是美国。我不认为美国会支持“去美元化”，他们会施加巨大的政治、经济等各种阻力。我不便详细阐述这些阻力的方式，大家可以想象一下，但我们都知道这种阻力的存在。

去美元化将面临巨大的挑战，我希望各国也能认识到去美元化所需的基础设施，这需要投入大量的财力、人力和知识储备。我希望各国能够一起努力，克服重重阻力。去美元化绝非易事，但并不意味着不会发生。我们应准备好“长期奋战”，因为去美元化需要很多年，肯定不会明年就发生。

英文原文：

Guancha: Ms Li, what has been the greatest challenge in your work as senior advisor on South-South corporation and development finance?

Li Yuefen: Well, I think the emphasis of my work is still on research and analysis. That is, to follow the recent, most up to date developments in the world, especially in the developing countries, and also the challenges facing the developing countries in terms of South-South cooperation, economic development, development finance. As you’ve heard, we prepare research papers, policy briefs and brief delegations in Geneva, sometimes New York, on the most recent developments. That’s regarding research and analytics.

We also provide advisory services to the diplomatic corps in Geneva and sometimes in New York, which means we assist them in their negotiations in the areas of trade, finance, development and in various institutions in WTO, in the United Nations conference on trade and development, in WHO, WIPO and human rights, on various fronts, mostly in Geneva. Sometimes countries would approach us for advice on some of their national challenges, the strategies they are discussing, and the advice they would like to seek. That’s advisory service and negotiations.

We also implement and undertake technical assistant projects. For instance, we assisted one member country to set up the South-South and triangular cooperation institution in their country. That’s quite a complicated process, because we need to do the feasibility study, analysis of their current institutional setup, the current weaknesses and gaps in the country on the front of South-South and triangular cooperation, and also help them to design, if they want to set up an institution, what   interfaces would be required with other institutions, other ministries in the country, and within what legal and regulatory framework, as well as various related issues. This was a complicated technical assistant project.

And for these projects, we very often cooperate with other institutions like regional development banks and United Nations system institutions. For instance, last year we implemented a project with the Food and Agricultural Organization based in Rome. We have different kinds of projects ongoing, sometimes it could be very short, like a one-off seminars.

Guancha: You mentioned development financing. We know that one issues developing countries are faced with is the lack of financing. How important is financing for development? What are some ways developing countries have worked to grow financing?

Li Yuefen: I think development financing is extremely important for developing countries because of their development stages. There has been, and I think will be a big financing gap for developing countries. There are various kinds of assessment of the size of the gaps, some say developing countries would require one trillion dollars a year in order to fulfill or implement the SDGs. The financing gap is inherent and it is huge. For developing countries to create or mobilize financial resources via organic economic GDP growth, it would be very difficult, it would take a very long period of time and it would really delay tremendously the catching up process with the developed countries.

Traditionally, to a lesser extent now, countries relied on official development assistance. We call that in brief ODA, which goes through fluctuations and volatility, as well as various kinds of diversions. It’s called development assistance, but it may not really be channeled to development.

In the past, especially some least developed countries rely a lot on this ODA and we call that aid reliance of these countries. They depend on ODA for filling their financing gap as much as possible. But we know nowadays there are various kinds of ODA diversions. For instance, with the Ukraine war, the developed countries use a lot of ODA for accommodating refugees in their own countries, which means ODA actually is spent within the developed countries for, to some extent, geopolitical purposes, it’s not directly for economic development of developing countries at all.

From 1996, when we had the heavily indebted developing countries debt relief initiative, followed by another initiative where the major donor countries provided funds to the international financial institutions to provide multilateral debt relief. After that, there was a tremendous change from the donor countries. Major donor countries basically stopped or drastically reduced their bilateral ODA. Some countries pronounce very clearly we are no longer bilateral donors.

About the same time, international financial institutions encouraged developing countries to tap into the international capital market. The credit rating agencies also started to give higher sovereign ratings to developing countries, and financial institutions started to take on more risks, to lend to countries, even to those without a credit rating.

With the great push and pull for tapping into the private capitals, some of the frontier economies, for instance, African countries, they’ve started to float sovereign bonds, starting to borrow heavily at the international capital market. At that time I was working in the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. I had meetings with some of the ministers of finance of African countries. I said, you need to be careful when you borrow so heavily, you need to think about whether or not you would have the capacity to service this debt. But that was the time when the Bretton Woods institutions encouraged these countries to develop their financial market and also go international. It’s difficult to resist the trend, many countries started to borrow heavily.

Some developing countries have also started to borrow domestically, so they’ve accumulated big domestic debt. If you look at the debt composition of low income countries, you will see that for them, domestic debt constitutes about 50% of the total debt of some countries.

Guancha: There are frequent rumors on Western media of China’s so-called “debt trap diplomacy”. What does the reality of Chinese lending look like?

Li Yuefen: I think especially for me, who has worked on the debt issues for a few decades, I see this opinion shaping thing happening. I’ve also seen it gradually being corrected. It started at the very beginning with the Sri Lanka port incident, involving misinterpretation or misreporting, because it was covered in the news media that China took over the port for 99 years. That was a shock to the world and also to the people working on the debt issues. Gradually you’ve seen some of the report coverage about China using debt as a means to grab strategically important assets of debtor countries. Then there was this discussion about whether or not China has been using debt as an instrument to create a “debt trap” for countries in order to push for their foreign policy.

The media coverage sometimes doesn’t really correspond to the realities happening in the world. In the recent 2 or 3 years, you’ve seen very solid studies and papers based on empirical research to say, very clearly, that up to now, they haven’t seen one incidence of China taking over, grabbing asset of debtor countries. In Sri Lanka, clearly it was not like that. It was very important for them to get the financing and to bridge their gap. For a few countries, I’ve seen papers with tables of the claimed grabbing of assets by China through creating this debt trap, where each column said the fact was not like that, it was proved, and had not been correctly reported.

It’s difficult for a country as China with different sources of lending, private, bilateral, public, to purposely, coherently create a debt trap. I don’t see that China has this   capacity. And I have not read clear, defined Chinese policy for this debt diplomacy.

I think there are rooms for improvement for Chinese lending to developing countries. For instance, for a development banks, regional development banks, or world bank, if they have a big project, they would carry out a very detailed feasibility study and look into the social aspects, cultural aspects, economic aspects, ecosystem, which means whether there is a climate change effect from this project. I think for China, when they undertake infrastructure projects, it would be good to conduct very detailed feasibility study to study all kinds of factors before starting the project, and also do a good analysis of the ability of the country to pay, the revenue situation, balance of payment situation, and the entire GDP trajectory, to see whether the country has the ability to absorb the debt created by various projects or different kinds of lending for different purposes.

I see room for improvement, for transparency, but I also see that the current discussion has been tinted by the current geopolitical debate in the world. Objectivity is extremely important for economic studies and also for media coverage when it comes to issues like debt. I’ve just been to the World Bank Spring Meeting, and I still see that this objectivity is not being fully reflected and the discussions have sometimes been distracted by geopolitical concerns. And as a result, the most important issues, for instance, the reform of the international architecture on debt has been omitted or not given enough attention.

Guancha: In order to combat inflation and stop the formation of financial bubbles, many developed countries, namely the US, have rapidly hiked their Central Bank interest rates. How has this affected developing countries? What can developing countries do to mitigate any adverse effects?

Li Yuefen: I think this is a terribly important issue for developing countries. First of all, I must say that monetary normalization is necessary. However, with regards to the rapid interest hikes we’ve been facing recently, I think that requires more coordination among the major systemically important countries and also communication with the developing countries. The spillover effects of these   rapid hikes of interest rates are  enormous on the developing countries. We’ve seen that inflation has hit many developing countries. In some countries, it’s triple digits, surpasses 100%, 200% and double digits inflation in many developing countries.

Massive currency depreciation has been happening in quite a number of developing countries, which means debt servicing cost has been increasing tremendously. So you see quite a number of developing countries are facing balance of payments problems, and also their fiscal position has been deteriorating quickly. In some countries, for instance Sri Lanka, the foreign exchange reserves has been completely depleted, and drastically reduced for many other countries.

People in developing countries are suffering because of the interest hikes, and poverty has increased. Inflation actually would touch upon the major items, food items that the poor people would have to really consume every day. So it’s a major cause of increasing poverty.

The repercussion, the spillover effect has been widespread and also quite dramatic. I think this is a big challenge for the developing countries, and we see that an increasing number of countries will be facing the problem of default. That is, they will not be able to service their debt and they have to declare bankruptcy at a sovereign level. That will be a global systemic challenge.

Facing this situation, what can the developing countries do? First of all, we know that countries with good economic fundamentals suffer less. The countries with weak economic fundamentals, they plunge into crisis. For these countries, it’s important for them to look very carefully at their fiscal position. I would not recommend austerity because people are already suffering a great deal. I think they should try to introduce preemptive measures to maintain financial stability in the country as much as the country can.

Capital control is one measure that countries can use. Because of interest rate hikes, capital has been flying out of developing countries and going back to the developed countries. Whenever it’s necessary and possible, capital control is one measure that countries can use to lessen or mitigate the financial volatility in the country.

And of course, social safety net is important. Whenever the fiscal position allows, the government should consider how to introduce targeted social service for the vulnerable population in the country.

Internationally, developing countries should unite and request for international financial support, for instance, floating SDRs in the IMF, as well as mobilization of resources from regional banks and from the private sector to assist these countries. And necessary swap lines among central banks would be important to be established or expanded to mitigate financial volatility once it happens; for developing countries, the swap line already in existence is very small. There are various kinds of measures they can think about, but they need to adopt these measures preemptively to ward off the crisis that will be coming.

Guancha: Partly as a result of this, a number of major banks have run into significant difficulties, including Credit Suisse here in Switzerland. What effect do you think this will have on financing in developing countries? How can developing countries prepare for these effects, as well as prevent banking crises in their own country?

Li Yuefen: For the recent bank failures, one very important warning to other countries is that banks should be well regulated and there should be transparency. When the banks put all the eggs in one basket, they don’t have good risk management. The banks should be always aware of the third party risk, for instance Credit Suisse and the Silicon Valley Bank.

For the Silicon Valley Bank, one important thing is the mismatch in the maturity of their assets. For instance, they use short term deposits for long term instruments, and in the end, when there are interest rate hikes, there is a run on the bank. Proper regulation, proper transparency, so that the authorities and even ordinary citizens know what is happening will be very important for the banking sector and also for the financial sector of an entire country. This is an important lesson.

Also, through the bailing out, or through the rescue of these two banks, we can also see the big challenges facing the developing countries. You can see very clearly that the two banks, within two or three days, they could raise hundreds of billions of dollars through swap lines. In the US, the swap line is huge on a daily basis.

When I went to the Washington Spring Meeting, the developing countries were saying, the US can raise hundreds of billions of dollars and save the bank within three days, while for developing countries, once they face financial difficulties, three years they don’t see things moving. Here we can see the asymmetry in the liquidity provision to developed countries and the liquidity provision to the developing countries. Big difference.

This is an important issue and also shows the need for the reform of the international financial architecture. You see the need to increase the voices and the representation of developing countries in the decision process of the international financial architecture. This is a very important time to raise this issue because many developing countries are facing lots of problems. The close monitoring and regulation of the banking sector is very important, it rings a warning bell for developing countries to watch out and pay attention to possible similar banking problems that could happen to their own financial sector.

Guancha: In recent weeks, efforts to achieve “de-dollarization” appear to be gaining steam. Russian president Putin recently pledged to adopt the RMB for payments between Russia and much of the Global South. During his visit to China, Brazilian president Lula publicly questioned why we can’t use our own currency in trading that doesn’t concern the US. Even France just conducted its first LNG sale in RMB. What do you think is behind this push for de-dollarization? What do you think is its prospect in the short term? What about the medium to long term?

Li Yuefen: I think the recent developments have shown that dollarization for all these past decades have a lot of problems especially for developing countries. The US dollar, as an international reserve currency, has exorbitant benefits for the country.

When countries really do have dollarization in their particular countries, they actually lose sovereign control of their monetary policies, completely giving it away, which means their monetary policy depends on the US dollar. For the running of the economy, it’s a huge disadvantage at times of crisis

Being an international civil servant working on the financial areas, for years we’ve been discussing the issue of possible de-dollarization. However, there are lots of challenges for de-dollarization. I myself would hope that people would not have high expectations for a quick de-dollarization process, because right now, for instance, the SWIFT system, the clearing system for trade and banking sector, is completely dominated by the United States. Of course, we also have other system there, but it plays a minor role. The clearing system itself is hugely important. And if you want de-dollarization, and you cannot solve the clearing system, it won’t be happening.

We know that the European union tried to set up another clearing system (INSTEX). It has gone to certain stages, developed for several years. But, from what I read, largely owing to resistance from the United States, they have stopped this initiative, anyways I haven’t seen any progress going on.

On the whole, you need also to have other financial infrastructure in order to materialize the de-dollarization. That would take time to develop. And most importantly, there is the United States. I don’t see the US viewing this positively, and there is huge political resistance and material resistance in various ways. I don’t want to mention what ways, you can think about that, and you know they exist.

I see it as something that we should work on very hard together, and I also see tremendous challenges. I hope experts, countries would also take into consideration of the needed infrastructure in order to allow the de-dollarization to happen. That requires a lot of work and also requires a lot of financial resources, a lot of human resources, and a lot of expertise. Let’s hope countries can work together and overcome various kinds of resistance. It won’t be an easy job, but it doesn’t mean that it will not happen. We should aim for the long term, because it would really take years. It won’t happen next year certainly.

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