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Responding to the publication of the Fiscal Monitor by the International Monetary Fund today, Susana Ruiz, Oxfam International's Tax Policy Lead, said: “Oxfam strongly welcomes the IMF’s call for progressive and emergency taxes to fund the recovery from the COVID-19 crisis, including taxing excess corporate profits and top income levels.

In response to the selection today of Ajay Banga as President of the World Bank for a five-year term beginning 2 June, Katie Malouf-Bous, interim Head of Oxfam International’s Washington DC Office, said: "The true test of Ajay Banga starts now: to reorient the World Bank to tackle the extreme inequality that robs billions of people of economic security and dignity. We need huge new investments in development but we need them to be publicly-led and purposed to lift people out of poverty —and we need guardrails around private finance that has run riot for too long."

The Covid-19 pandemic will not be defeated unless it’s defeated in all countries. In developing countries, where public health spending is often severely constrained, significant debt cancellation will be necessary to deal with the double whammy of health and economic crises.

We need to transform our economies to deliver universal health, education and other public services. To make this possible, the richest people and corporations should pay their fair share of tax. This will drive a dramatic reduction in the gap between rich and poor and between women and men.

The strategy to end extreme poverty and support inclusive growth is an important milestone for the World Bank and Oxfam welcomes Jim Kim’s vision and commitment.

In a major new report, Oxfam calls for aid to be increased, better targeted, made more predictable and governed more accountably.

The World Bank’s new assessment on the scale of finance needed to help developing countries adapt to the unavoidable impacts of climate change – $75-100bn per year on average from 2010-2050 – is a vital and timely contribution to the current climate negotiations under way in Bangkok.

The economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic could push half a billion more people into poverty unless urgent action is taken to bail out developing countries, said Oxfam today.

For every new billionaire created during the pandemic — one every 30 hours — nearly a million people could be pushed into extreme poverty in 2022 at nearly the same rate, reveals a new Oxfam brief today. “Profiting from Pain” is published as the World Economic Forum — the exclusive get-together of the global elite in Davos — takes place for the first time face-to-face since COVID-19, a period during which billionaires have enjoyed a huge boost to their fortunes. 

Contrary to the positive picture painted by the International Monetary Fund in its 2010 World Economic Outlook, poor countries are being forced to cut back on their economic crisis-response spending too soon.