South Africa’s Partial G20 Success in 2025 - SAIIA

This research paper evaluates South Africa's G20 presidency, noting its partial success in raising global awareness of Africa's challenges in accessing affordable development finance while highlighting a lack of consensus on reforming the G20's Common Framework for debt restructuring and the governance of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

• South Africa's G20 presidency has been partially successful in increasing global awareness regarding the difficulties African nations face in securing stable and affordable development finance. The document identifies several contributing factors to this problem, including the operating practices of credit rating agencies, legal and regulatory issues concerning risk and creditor fiduciary responsibilities, the debt sustainability analyses of the World Bank and IMF, a lack of transparency in African debt transactions, and the current governance and policies of international financial institutions.
• The G20's Common Framework for treating sovereign debtors in distress is viewed as problematic and in need of reform, as evidenced by the experiences of Chad, Ethiopia, Ghana, and Zambia. Issues include the sequential treatment of creditor groups which harms inter-creditor relations, a lack of universal agreement on the definition of 'comparability of treatment', and disagreements on how the IMF should incorporate social and environmental issues into debt sustainability analysis. These factors make the process slow, unpredictable, and biased toward creditors.
• Despite South Africa raising the profile of the need to reform the International Monetary Fund (IMF), there has been no G20 action on the matter. The IMF serves as the lender of last resort for Africa, but its operational policies and governance arrangements have not received significant G20 attention for many years, and the South African presidency is expected to conclude without an agreement on how to address these institutional needs.
• To address these gaps, President Cyril Ramaphosa has established an African Expert Panel, chaired by Trevor Manuel, to provide advice before the G20 summit. Potential recommendations from this panel include the creation of a technical committee to report on barriers to development finance in 2026 and proposals for an IMF reform process to be advocated within the G20, African Union, G7, United Nations, G24, and the World Bank–IMF Development Committee.

APA

South African Institute of International Affairs (2025). South Africa’s Partial G20 Success in 2025 - SAIIA. https://saiia.org.za/research/south-africas-partial-g20-success-in-2025/

Chicago

South African Institute of International Affairs. South Africa’s Partial G20 Success in 2025 - SAIIA. 2025. https://saiia.org.za/research/south-africas-partial-g20-success-in-2025/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=South African Institute of International Affairs |title=South Africa’s Partial G20 Success in 2025 - SAIIA |date=27 November 2025 |url=https://saiia.org.za/research/south-africas-partial-g20-success-in-2025/ |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{southafricaninstituteofinternationalaffairs2025south, author = {{South African Institute of International Affairs}}, title = {{South Africa’s Partial G20 Success in 2025 - SAIIA}}, institution = {South African Institute of International Affairs}, year = {2025}, month = nov, url = {https://saiia.org.za/research/south-africas-partial-g20-success-in-2025/}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }