Global cooperation required for victory over pandemic, experts say

Enhanced global efforts should be made to cushion the COVID-19 impact and deal with the mounting downward pressure on economic recovery, experts said at a global think tank webinar.

They warned of rising uncertainties and downward pressure, expecting policymakers to take more steps to shore up growth next year, with a key focus on dealing with rising inflation pressure, repairing global value and supply chains and fostering innovation-driven growth.

They made the remarks on Monday night during the Global Strategic Dialogue 2021, an international webinar themed on the open global economy and co-hosted by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and China Daily.

Natalya Ivanova, an academician at the Russian Academy of Sciences, said global recovery remains unbalanced as the ongoing pandemic continues to cast a shadow on economies, and policymakers should make more efforts to tackle the COVID-19 chaos and deal with the downward pressure on growth.

Ivanova said global policymakers need to take more fiscal and monetary measures to curb rising inflationary pressures in the globe, and more efforts should also be made to repair the global value and supply chains damaged by COVID-19 and promote fair and open competition that leads to more innovation and better results.

Ivanova's views are echoed by Yu Yongding, an academician at CASS, who highlighted the unprecedented challenges faced by the global economy, including the rampant COVID-19, the accelerated process of tapering by the Federal Reserve and strained relations between China and the United States.

"I believe China and the United States can escape the Thucydides trap, if the two countries can find and fight against common enemies," Yu said.

He listed a wide range of common enemies such as global warming, global poverty, international terrorism, pollution and pandemics, saying the most dangerous common enemy for the two countries as well as all countries is COVID-19.

"Without close corporation and coordination among all countries, it is impossible to win the war against COVID-19," he noted.

When it comes to reviving the economy, Naoyuki Yoshino, professor emeritus at Keio University, highlighted the importance of encouraging the private sector's participation in infrastructure investment.

Yoshino, who is also the former dean of the Asian Development Bank Institute, said as infrastructure can create additional tax revenues, these can be shared among investors and operators, which will help increase the rate of return and encourage more private sector participation into the infrastructure investment.

Mentioning that infrastructure usually harms the environment to some degree, he said the two issues of infrastructure investment and climate change should be discussed separately.

He said environmental issues can be solved by carbon tax and other tax policies, suggesting charging tax on carbon emissions globally at the same tax rate, which could achieve optimal portfolio allocation or unified green credit rating.