Plan to discuss new timetable for currency

Members of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council would discuss a new timetable for a common currency, but that the policy response from each member to the financial crisis had been different, the UAE Central Bank Governor Sultan Nasser Al Suwaidi said.

Gulf central bankers gave little sign of a new timetable for currency union at a regular gathering yesterday, offering markets little hope that they would at least seek to revive efforts to find a political consensus on the issue.

He said the GCC countries need to tackle the financial crisis individually, not as a group.

"Each GCC country has to tackle his own financial crisis according to his own individual need. There should not be any unified decision for all states," Suwaidi said.

The GCC last month gave its first official acknowledgement that issuing common notes and coins will take longer than the 2010 target agreed on eight years ago.

The financial crisis is expected to push down growth at several GCC as the sharp fall in oil prices cuts state income from energy exports. Policy responses among GCC members have varied widely.

When asked about setting a new timeline at the meeting, Suwaidi said, "We will have to discuss: it's not only one country's decision. The issues that each state has to respond to are different [and] every country has taken its own crisis measures."