Global economic recovery next year - IMF

The global economy should begin showing signs of recovery by next year, IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said yesterday during a visit to the central Asian state of Tajikistan.

The fund chief said that although this year was likely to continue to bring difficulties, negative global financial trends should begin to retreat by 2010. "We.... expect that the rate of growth in the global economy will begin to recover next year, and with the rate of growth recovering in the world economy, so too will it grow in your country," he told reporters through a translator.

Strauss-Kahn made the comments to reporters after meeting with Tajik president Emomali Rakhmon as part of a tour of central Asian states, many of which have been badly affected by the global financial downturn. Despite data that the plunge in remittances from Tajik labourers working in Russia and China is straining the economy, Strauss-Kahn said Dushanbe had pursued largely sound anti-crisis measures.

"I think what has been done by the government was correct given the situation in the economy, especially on the monetary side and by letting the currency depreciate," he said. Tajikistan - a mountainous former Soviet republic which borders China and Afghanistan - has struggled to provide even basic services for its citizens in recent years, with blackouts the norm across much of the country last winter.

The IMF boss began his regional tour on Monday in Central Asia's economic powerhouse, Kazakhstan, whose resource-driven economy has been battered as the global economic downturn has forced down commodities prices.

The trip comes as China and Russia are both seeking to increase their influence in this strategically vital region, as evidenced by billions in loans, aid and investment from Moscow and Beijing in recent months.