What is the G20?

Leaders of the G20 are meeting in London today to discus how to fix the economic meltdown that is happening around the world. For the US and for many of these countries this is the biggest economic crisis since the 1930's. What are the origins of the G20? Sound like a new drink...

A Group of Twenty (G20):
The Group of Twenty(G20) first met in Berlin, Germany in December 1999. This group was created because of the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98, which exposed the need to bring emerging market nations into the core of global economic discussion and governance. The groups goal is to work together to head off major economic problems with the hopes of limiting global effects.

The 19 members of the G20 in alphabetic order are: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States of America.

Why is the group called the G20 if it only has 19 countries? Because the European Union is also a member and is represented by the rotating Council presidency and the European Central Bank. The finance ministers and central bank governors of the G20 meet annually.

The G20 represents 80% of the world's trade, 90% of the world's gross national product and 67% of the world's population. So there is a lot of power in these meetings and a lot of responsibility. The decisions made here can and will affect the entire world.

An update on what happenned in the meetings tomorrow.

Check out http://money.cnn.com/2009/04/01/news/international/Obama_G20/index.htm?postversion=2009040109 for what is going on now at the meetings.

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