The Ninth G20 Leaders' Summit: 15-16 Nov 2014

Introduction
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, arrived at Brisbane, Australia on a five-day trip, on 14
Nov 2014, to attend the G-20 Summit on the second leg of his 10-day three-nation tour
after the conclusion of the ASEAN and the East Asia Summit at Myanmar.
The key issues that the Indian PM carried with him to solicit global cooperation during
the G20 Summit were cross border tax avoidance and evasion, creation of digital
infrastructure and ensuring access to clean and affordable energy.
General Information about G20
G20 is a forum for international economic cooperation amongst 20 major developed and
developing economies of the world. It was founded in 1999, as a forum for finance
ministers and central bank governors who met once a year, to discuss international
economic issues.
The global economic crisis in 2008 evolved the G20 into the premier Leaders Forum
for international economic cooperation. Hence, the G20 was formally launched in 2008
in the USA.
The G20 includes 19 individual countries, i.e. Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada,
China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Russia,
Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the UK and the USA and the European Union (EU).
Collectively, the G20 economies account for around 85 per cent of the GDP, 80 per cent
of world trade and two-thirds of the world population.
The G20 has no permanent secretariat, and much of the preparation for the summit is
completed by G20 leaders personal representatives, known as Sherpas.
Sherpas maintain contact with each other over the course of the year to discuss
agenda items for the summit and coordinate the work of the G20.
Annual meetings of finance ministers and central bank governors continue to take
place, advancing the work of the G20 and contributing to the discussions at leaders
summits.
Summit hosts are responsible for preparing leaders summits and for organizing the
series of preparatory meetings that advance G20 work throughout the year.

At each meeting, the host country invites non-member guest countries to attend. For
2014, Australia invited Spain, Mauritania, Myanmar, Senegal, New Zealand and
Singapore.
The Contours of the G20 Summit - 2014
The ninth G20 Leaders' Summit in 2014 was held on 15 and 16 November in Brisbane,
Queensland. The principal meeting venue was the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition
Centre, and as many as 4,000 delegates and 3,000 media representatives attended.
Jobs and growth remained the primary focus of the G20 summit, besides discussing
issues like, economic cooperation, terrorism, climate change and Ebola, etc.
On 15 Nov 2014, an informal meeting of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and
South Africa) took place ahead of the G20 Summit. Issues discussed by the leaders
included, progress made in the establishment of the BRICS New Development Bank
(NDB), as decided during the sixth BRICS Summit held in Brazil in July this year.
PM Modi raised the following issues during his intervention at the informal BRICS meet:

Repatriation of Black Money, which he mentioned was a serious economic and

security challenge to the world.

Highlighted political turbulence in many parts of the world, and the Ebola
pandemic as factors of grave concern.

Need to revive economic confidence and boost growth and job creation by
improving international policy coordination, and reform global economic
institutions, mainly IMF to accommodate the dynamic emerging economies of the
World.

Creation of a digital hub for sharing of information pertaining to trade

opportunities and best practices for infrastructure development.

PM held bi-lateral talks with President of France, Mr. Francois Hollande, and the
Prime Minister of Canada, Mr. Stephen Harper. In both these meetings the issue
of terrorism and means of tackling this menace being faced by both these
countries was discussed. He has been extended the invitation to visit both these
countries, which he has accepted and perhaps the visit will be slated during early
next year.

PM Modi had a meeting with British PM David Cameron and German Chancellor
Merkel; both desired to engage with India in promoting economic cooperation and have
invited Indian PM to visit their respective countries. The recent decision of HRD ministry
to replace German language with Sanskrit in KV school curriculum was raised by the
German Chancellor with PM Modi.

Highlights of PM Modis keynote address during a G20 session on 16 Nov 2014 titled
"Delivering Global Economic Resilience", he raised the following issues:

Voiced support for a new global automatic exchange of information, to assist in

tracing unaccounted money stashed abroad and also bring about synergy in
global trade and infrastructure development projects.

He said that coordinated decisions taken through the use of technology and
cyber space would help towards a resilient global financial system.

He remarked that the reform processes must be people driven and should be
insulated from political pressures.

He solicited close cooperation amongst all nations in addressing the challenge of

black money, to effectively contain security issues like terrorism, drug trafficking,
arms smuggling, etc.

Prime Minister urged every jurisdiction, especially, tax havens, to provide

information for tax purposes in accordance with treaty obligations.

He strongly believed that the introduction of tougher standards would reveal the
identities of individuals and/or companies channelling illegal funds to terror
organisations like the Islamic State.

Final communiqu of G20 Summit-2014

On 16 Nov 2014, during the final communiqu, Leaders from the G20 group of nations
agreed to boost flagging global growth tackle climate change and crack down on tax
avoidance but ties between the West and Russia plummeted to a new low over the
crisis in Ukraine.
Security and climate change overshadowed G20 talks. The following major issues were
addressed in the final communiqu:

Measures to be adopted to boost global economic growth to add extra 2.1

percentage points to global growth over five years, which would add more than
$2 trillion to the global economy and create millions of jobs.

Leaders committed to tackle global tax avoidance, which was denying

government's billions of dollars in revenue and was being used to fund terrorism.

Strong and effective action to address climate change with the aim of adopting a
protocol, with legal force, at a U.N. Climate Conference in Paris in 2015.

President Obama urged all nations to act, and committed $3 billion to the Green
Climate Fund. Japan pledged $1.5 billion to the fund.

World leaders also agreed to unite in the fight against Ebola and provide all
possible humanitarian assistance.

The summit won a commitment by each country to close the gap between its
male and female labour-force participation rates by 25% by 2025.

President Obama, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Japanese Prime
Minister Shinzo Abe lined up together against Russia, vowing to oppose what
they called Moscow's efforts to destabilize eastern Ukraine and impose harsher
sanction.

Conclusion
In the final analysis leaders of the worlds most dynamic economies touched upon
various global issues that required immediate attention and discussed ways and means
to create a congenial environment for boosting economic cooperation and job creation.
Turkey took over the presidency from Australia and will host the summit in Antalya next
year, while China would be home to the G20 in 2016.