NEW YORK (Reuters) – It is incumbent on the United States to support a capital increase at the Inter American Development Bank, the bank’s president said on Thursday.
“The IDB is the lender of preference of the region, and if the IDB doesn’t step up and have the resources to do so the region is going to look for alternatives,” said Mauricio Claver-Carone, who took the reigns of the development bank in October as its first-ever U.S. president.
“So it behooves the United States and it behooves the United States Congress to support a capital increase for the bank.”
Claver-Carone said the IDB has scaled down its role as a guide to the region’s private sector and there has been a “recalibration over the past 20 or 30 years from Latin America to Asia.” He said there is a “unique opportunity” to bring that back.
The IDB president spoke at an online event organized by the Americas Society/Council of the Americas.
(Reporting by Rodrigo Campos)
