Publication: Sound Practice in Government Debt Management
Date
2004
ISSN
Published
2004
Author(s)
Wheeler, Graeme
Abstract
Government debt management has a long
tradition. More than three centuries ago, the Bank of
England was managing government debt, and the origins of
Sweden's National Debt Office go back to 1789.1 In
recent years, there has been a move toward building the
professionalism of government debt management, beginning
with the establishment of the New Zealand Debt Management
Office in 1988 and Ireland's National Treasury
Management Agency in 1990. It is no accident that the
countries that were the first to substantially upgrade their
government debt management in the late 1980s and early 1990s
were those with histories of fiscal problems, high ratios of
public sector debt to gross domestic product (GDP), and a
large proportion of foreign currency debt in their
government debt portfolios.2 These same features are
characteristic of many developing countries today. Concern
over rising government indebtedness has been a factor behind
debt management reforms in Brazil, China, Colombia, India,
the Republic of Korea, Mexico, South Africa, and Thailand,
and it helps explain why several other governments,
including those of Jordan, Lebanon, and Peru, are
considering extensive reforms in government debt management.
Citation
“Wheeler, Graeme. 2004. Sound Practice in Government Debt Management. © Washington, DC: World Bank. http://openknowledge.worldbank.org/entities/publication/9f5eb659-6ff5-5b83-9f6c-e2b93bc439b6 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”