17 November 2008: 116th Meeting of the Working Party on Export Credits and Credit Guarantees (ECG)

1.       The Members of the OECD Working Party on Export Credits and Credit Guarantees (ECG) met on 17 November 2008; the meeting was chaired by Ms. Nicole BOLLEN (the Netherlands).

2.       The ECG welcomed non OECD countries who provide official export credits and who were participating in the meeting as ad hoc observers; Brazil, China, Estonia, India, Israel, Romania, Russian Federation, Slovenia and South Africa. Representatives from other OECD Directorates attended the meeting to update the committee on issues of mutual interest.

3.       The main issues for discussion were export credits, in the context of:

• Global financial crisis: this was the subject of extensive discussion and subsequently OECD and some non-OECD countries agreed a statement pledging continued export credit support for international trade deals in line with the call by G20 leaders for emerging and developing economies to retain access to financing for imports in the present financial crisis: this statement is available on the OECD website
• Peer review: members agreed to an enhanced peer review process for monitoring the two OECD Recommendations (on environment and anti-bribery measures); this process builds on existing review mechanisms and includes provision for participation by Civil Society Organisations and additional public disclosure of information: more details are available on the OECD website (

  http://webdomino1.oecd.org/olis/2008doc.nsf/Linkto/tad-ecg(2008)23).

• Environment and Bribery: the provisional reviews of members’ responses to surveys on implementation of the two OECD Recommendations were discussed; the responses to both surveys and the analyses of these will be made publicly available on the OECD website, once they have been finalised.

4.       The next plenary meeting of the ECG will take place in the week of 20 April 2009.

XCRED Secretariat
November 2008