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SHOTLIST 1. International Monetary Fund (IMF) officials walk into news conference 2. Reporters 3. SOUNDBITE (English) Raghuram Rajan, IMF Chief Economist: "The world economy also seems to be by-and-large in the spring time of recovery. The tentative buds that we saw six months ago are now blooming in many parts of the world. We have seen a strong rebound in world trade, robust US recovery, continued exceptional strong growth in emerging Asia, especially China and the strong showing for the Japanese economy, that we have seen since 1996." 4. Reporters 5. SOUNDBITE (English) Raghuram Rajan, IMF Chief Economist: "Given this improving environment, we have increased our forecast for global growth by about a half percentage point to four point six percent for 2004 and four point four percent for 2005. This means that if all goes as expected, we are in the best two years in over a decade." 6. Reporters 7. SOUNDBITE (English) Raghuram Rajan, IMF Chief Economist: "Of course, in this rosy picture there remains risks to the short term outlook. For instance, oil prices will affect global growth if they're sustained or increased further. Already recognise for every five dollar barrel increase above baseline, there remains for one full year, global growth decreases by point three percent. Higher oil prices have reflected in part strong demand. Growth, during the last year, has been especially strong in China and in the United States. And if this is the cause for higher oil prices, it will not derail recovery." 8. Reporters 9. SOUNDBITE (English) Raghuram Rajan, IMF Chief Economist: "Part of the pressure on oil prices, the upward pressure, has been because of that. The second factor, however, has also been uncertainty. Because oil is produced, in some of the most - how shall we say - volatile regions of the world, there has been concern, especially given the news coming out of Iraq and the Middle East that there could be supply disruptions." 10. Reporters 11. SOUNDBITE (English) Raghuram Rajan, IMF Chief Economist: "Thus far we haven't seen much effect, direct effect, of the Madrid attacks and confidence but you know it is hard to remain confident that that will be the case if something else hits in a different location. So, yes we are worried about terrorism, that is why we are saying again and again, that it's time to rebuild our insurance, to rebuild our buffers that we have, so if something happens, we have the opportunity to deal with it." 12. Wide shot of Rajan 13. Various shots of protesters in front of the World Bank STORYLINE: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicted on Wednesday that the global economy - after being battered by recession, terrorist attacks and war - should grow strongly this year and next with growth in the US hitting the fastest pace in 20 years. The IMF significantly increased its growth forecast both for the US and the global economy in its latest World Economic Outlook, but IMF officials cautioned the rosy outlook could be undone by further terrorist attacks or a sharp increase in oil prices. The IMF said the US budget and trade deficits "remain a serious concern" especially because of the risks that these imbalances could trigger a disorderly fall in the value of the US dollar which could destabilise the global economy. The IMF predicted the global economy would expand by 4.6 percent this year after growing by 3.9 percent in 2003. Those growth rates are 0.6 of a percentage point higher than the IMF's last global forecast made in September. For 2005, the IMF sees continued strong global output of 4.4 percent. You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/a811c0a2c70aec40f563ad25d030e36b Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork