Shang Ming
Ladies, gentlemen, and comrades: I am very pleased to open this colloquium, which is being jointly sponsored by the People’s Bank of China and the International Monetary Fund. This marks the first time, since the People’s Republic of China resumed its position in the Fund in April 1980, that our two institutions have jointly sponsored such a colloquium. The initiative for it came from Mr. de Larosiere, Managing Director of the Fund, when he was visiting China in October–November 1981.
A great deal of preparatory work for the colloquium has been done by our People’s Bank and the Fund. I would like to express, on behalf of the People’s Bank, our sincere thanks to the speakers from the Fund. Chinese participants include staff of various economic and financial departments and institutions, as well as professors from several distinguished universities and financial and economic colleges in China. Please permit me also, on behalf of the Bank, to extend a warm welcome to all the specialists and comrades attending the meeting. In the past two years, contacts between China and the Fund have increased, and understanding between us has deepened. The present colloquium will, I trust, provide us with another opportunity to deepen our mutual understanding.
During the colloquium, the representatives of the Fund will discuss developments in the international monetary system, the world economic situation, and the role of the Fund in the world economy. The Chinese economists, Professor Luo Yuanzheng and Associate Professor Hong Junyan, will address China’s role in the world economy and the current economic situation in the West. Discussions will be held following the speeches.
I believe that, by the end of the colloquium, our understanding of the Fund’s policies and its operation will have increased. I hope that the representatives of the Fund will also feel that they have deepened their knowledge of the economic situation in China and of China’s economic policies.
I think this colloquium should be regarded as merely the beginning of interchanges between China and the Fund on the policies and operations of that institution. I look forward to further assistance from the Fund in arranging such activities for our mutual benefit. Finally, I wish the colloquium a complete success.
Wm. C. Hood
Mr. Chairman, ladies, and gentlemen: The International Monetary Fund greatly appreciates the opportunity to cosponsor this colloquium with the People’s Bank of China—the first opportunity of its kind since the People’s Republic of China decided to resume its membership in the Fund and the World Bank.
On behalf of the management of the Fund, we extend greetings to our Chinese hosts. The visit of the Managing Director in late 1981 was designed to provide him with the opportunity to learn about China as well as to explain the Fund. The staff team participating in the colloquium has a similar duty—to explain the complex international organization that is the Fund and to seek to understand the perceptions of Chinese participants about the institution and their own country.
The Fund has experience of centrally planned economies, especially those of Eastern Europe. But it is still in the process of accumulating knowledge and insight into the workings of a centrally planned economy the size of China, an economy that has also embarked on an intensive modernization program using foreign technology, skills, and capital. This promises to be a historic change, not only for China but for the rest of the world and for international organizations like the Fund that have been established to help facilitate international cooperation.
Among these institutions, the Fund is one of the most specialized. It deals with financial matters: it administers a code of conduct in the settlement of payments transactions; it supervises the exchange rate policies of its members; and it provides financial support to members to tide them over temporary difficulties in their external accounts. It has the power to create an internationally accepted reserve asset, the SDR, and has the potential to become a central bank for the world. Finally, it is an international forum, where governments have come together to establish a permanent institution for consultation and for consensus-building among its member countries on matters within the competence of the Fund. In the sessions that follow, the members of the Fund staff team will seek to present these different aspects of the Fund and to understand how they apply to the conditions of a centrally planned economy like China. We look forward to the experience.
The care and efficiency of the preparations made for the colloquium by the Chinese authorities and their Washington representatives, Messrs. Zhang Zicun and Wang Enshao, represent a happy beginning. Success now depends on the frankness and objectivity with which all of us, both the Fund staff and the Chinese participants, approach the program we have before us. We would especially like to express our appreciation to Mr. Shang Ming, Advisor of the People’s Bank of China, for the interest that he has evinced in the organization of the colloquium.