Twentieth Report on the Activities of the Monetary Committee.

Abstract

The expansion of world economic activitycontinued to be moderate in 1978. Growth rates bothof production and world trade were similar to thoseof 1977. The structure of balances of paymentsaltered greatly: on the one hand, the OPEC surplusfell markedly, and the deficit of the non-oilproducing developing countries increased and, on theother hand, the OECD countries went back intosurplus. Among these latter, developments were nothomogeneous: the United States' deficit worsenedfurther, but was more than compensated by theimprovement in the balances of other countries, parti-cularly the Community and Japan.