South Africa Calls for Policy Coordination Amid Fed Tapering

South Africa said it wants agreement within the Group of 20 nations on the coordination of economic policies as it pushes for stronger acknowledgment of the impact of the Federal Reserve’s tapering on smaller nations.

The rand fell 19 percent in the past year, threatening to push inflation through the central bank’s upper band and forcing policy makers to unexpectedly increase interest rates last month. The pass-through from a weaker currency to inflation has been more immediate while the benefits to exports “take a bit longer to respond,” South Africa’s Deputy Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene said in interview in Sydney today.