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Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Swiss Federal Council, concerned about changes to the G20 group of the world’s largest economies and calls for changes to other international financial bodies, has told the country’s finance ministry to take steps to strengthen Switzerland’s role in the IMF (International Monetary Fund) and the World Bank. Developing countries and emerging markets have been calling for reform of these two bodies, the two Bretton Woods international financial institutions, in recent months, suggesting that voting weights need to be reconsidered. Switzerland is keen to ensure that its seats on the Executive Councils of each group become permanent.

The cabinet (Federal Council) has also instructed the finance ministry to work closely with the Swiss National Bank and the Swiss financial market supervisory authority Finma to strengthen its role in the Financial Stability Board (FSB).

The FSB deals with international coordination of financial market regulation and international cooperation to ensure the stability of the financial system.

The government is also undertaking a review of its relationship to the G20. In a press release 22 October the cabinet noted that the group initially “was primarily a body for dialogue between the finance ministers and central bank governors of the G7 countries and the emerging countries. In autumn 2008 the G20 became a group of heads of state and heads of government in which, amongst other things, the challenges of the financial crisis and the global downturn were also jointly tackled at the highest level. Within a year it became the most important forum on issues to do with the international finance and economic system. However, due to the fact that Africa, the Middle East and Eastern Europe are to a large extent excluded and several important financial centres such as Switzerland are not represented, fundamental questions to do with structure and representation remain unresolved.”