Obama: G20 concur on economic policy

US President Barack Obama says the world is in broad agreement on the way forward for economic recovery following the global financial crisis of the 2008.

Speaking at a press conference in the South Korean capital of Seoul on Friday, Obama highlighted economic priorities such as growth, deficit reduction and the need for economies to better balance imports and exports in order to achieve a recovery.

“The work that we do here is not always going to seem dramatic. It’s not always going to be immediately world-changing. But step by step what we’re doing is building stronger international mechanisms and institutions that will help stabilize the economy, ensure economic growth and reduce some tensions,” Reuters quoted him as saying.

The US president also called on China to keep the market value of its currency in order for every nation to “benefit from trade.”

Obama said the Chinese yuan “is undervalued and China spends enormous amounts of value intervening in the market to keep it undervalued. So we’ve said it is important for China, in a gradual fashion to transition to a market-based foreign exchange system.”

Washington has long accused China of keeping its currency artificially low to boost exports. But China now counters that a US Federal Reserve’s plan to inject hundreds of billions of dollars into the United States economy will have harmful consequences for the global economy.

The US president made the comments on the fringes of a G20, the world’s strongest economies, summit.