World may see zero growth

PARIS - THE global economy as a whole could see zero growth this year as it reels from the effects of the financial crisis, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund said on Wednesday.

'The next IMF forecast, in three months time, could well be close to zero,' warned Dominique Strauss-Kahn in an interview to appear in Thursday's edition of the French business daily Les Echos.

The IMF already revised its 2009 growth forecast down to 0.5 per cent, with wealthy countries' economies in recession and expected to shrink by around two percent, and 'the figures we've seen since aren't good,' he added.

Mr Strauss-Kahn said he hoped that 2010 would see a turnaround, but repeated his warning that European banks were still carrying too much bad debt and said more needed to be done to clean up their balance sheets. -- AFP

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