The International Monetary Fund wants steps to spur stronger growth in Europe and Japan, but the outlook for the global economy is not as bad as many people think, a top IMF official said.
"The IMF's view is very strongly that we would like to see measures taken to see other legs on the stool, namely Europe and Japan, growing somewhat more rapidly because that would obviously be good for everybody, including the United States," IMF first deputy managing director Ms Anne Krueger said.
She did not elaborate on the measures the multilateral lender wanted.
Ms Krueger said the US upturn was "not quite as strong as people had expected" and the outlook for European economies was deteriorating almost monthly as numbers come in.
But there are bright spots in the global economy in the performances of smaller industrialised nations such as Canada and Australia and emerging economies such China, India, Russia and the Ukraine.
"I keep telling people the world economy is not as bad as they think," said Ms Krueger. "They look at Japan, the US and Europe and forget some of the smaller industrialised countries, such as Canada and Australia, who are doing well".
US Treasury Secretary Mr Paul O'Neill had earlier forecast that annual US growth could reach 4 per cent by mid-2003.