Dar es Salaam — THE International Monetary Fund (IMF) will act to ensure developed countries keep financial pledges to Africa as the global downturn deepens, even though the continent is likely to avoid a deep recession.

IMF MD Dominique Strauss-Kahn told a conference in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, the institution was reforming its policies to give poor countries better access to credit, and more influence over its decisions.

"I think the bottom line is clear, we need to act and we need to act now -- it's time to keep promises.

"The period where the IMF was mostly concerned about fiscal deficits, and thought that one size fits all, is now behind us. The world has changed," he said yesterday.

African policy makers at the conference, organised by the IMF and Tanzania, said they would demand that Group of Twenty (G-20) leaders meeting in London next month keep their promises to deliver scaled-up aid to the continent.

"Private external finance is frozen. And there is little room to raise more domestic revenue," said United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Ashe-Rose Migiro.

"Unless there is a genuine effort to deliver on existing commitments ... further instability and human suffering could result," she said in a keynote address to delegates at the conference yesterday. Migiro said there was no need for more aid beyond the $62bn which the Group of Eight developed countries had promised to lend to Africa by 2010.

African leaders fear these pledges will be forgotten as developed countries pump billions of dollars into their own economies in a bid to lift them out of the deepening recession.

Strauss-Kahn said earlier this week the IMF expected world economic growth to shrink this year. This could curb Africa's pace of expansion to below an estimated 3%, already half an earlier forecast of 6%.

"Our idea is that the (global) situation is deteriorating rather rapidly. But I don't believe there is a strong risk of recession for African countries," he said yesterday.

"It's time for the IMF to adapt to this new era and develop with Africa," Strauss-Kahn told the IMF conference. "The model has changed."

While the IMF may revise lower its 3,3% economic growth forecast for sub-Saharan Africa, there is not a risk of a "strong recession" on the continent this year, though per capita income growth may stagnate, Strauss-Kahn said.

Finance Minister Trevor Manuel said that parts of SA's economy were taking a lot of stress, and "we are seeing very big job losses". But he said the government would not "prop up" industries that should not exist.

Manuel, who is due to attend a meeting of G-20 finance ministers this weekend, said he would take a bold stand on behalf of African countries.

"I don't believe we should go to the G-20 as petitioners.

"I believe we should engage quite differently, as decision makers understanding what is wrong in the world," he said.

Manuel also took the IMF to task for its lack of diversity. "We need a club that allows us to speak with a single voice. We don't need to be shy or reticent about issues being raised. Power is still vested in the north."

Strauss-Kahn said that as far as he was concerned the tradition of having a European at the helm of the IMF and an American at the World Bank was "something from the past" but it was not up to him to choose a successor.

"It's time for the IMF to adapt to this new era ... it's certainly time for developed countries to be less arrogant," he said. "The crisis has led to the understanding that markets have to be regulated and supervised."

IMF officials said that over the next few weeks, the fund would discuss a range of proposals to make larger amounts of money available more quickly to poor countries.

It aims to double its low-cost lending capacity to $11bn over five years period from $5bn now.