EPFO APFC 2023 General Studies · Question 117 of 120

Correct — D, (d) The G20 comprises twenty countries. The ask is negative — 'not' is printed in bold italics in the stem — so three statements are true and one is false, and the false one is the count of members. The name is misleading and that is the whole point of the question. The Group of Twenty has never consisted of twenty countries. It brings together nineteen individual countries — Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Türkiye, the United Kingdom and the United States — together with a regional organisation, the European Union, which makes up the twentieth seat. A regional bloc is not a country, so the statement as printed is wrong however the arithmetic is done. The position has since moved in the direction that makes the statement even less defensible: at the New Delhi summit in September 2023 the African Union was admitted as a permanent member, so the group now consists of nineteen countries and two regional organisations, twenty-one members in all, while keeping its name. The other three statements stand. The G20 was founded in 1999, in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis, as a forum of finance ministers and central bank governors from systemically important economies; it was raised to the level of heads of state and government in 2008, when the global financial crisis made a leaders' forum necessary, and the first leaders' summit was held in Washington in November of that year. The summit is held annually under a rotating presidency, with the presidency passing from one member to another each year and the incumbent setting the agenda and hosting the summit; because the group has no permanent secretariat, continuity is maintained by the troika of the previous, current and incoming presidencies. India held the presidency in 2023, Indonesia in 2022, Brazil in 2024 and South Africa in 2025. And the members do represent around 85 per cent of global gross domestic product, along with over 75 per cent of international trade and about two-thirds of the world's population, which is the group's own standard description of its weight and the reason its decisions matter despite its having no treaty, no charter and no power to bind anyone.

• (a)It was founded in 1999. — This statement is true, so it cannot be the answer to a negative question. The G20 was founded in 1999, and the founding has a specific context worth remembering because papers test it: the Asian financial crisis of 1997 and 1998 showed that the established groupings of industrialised countries could not manage a crisis originating in emerging economies without those economies at the table, and the G20 was created as a forum of finance ministers and central bank governors from systemically important economies, developed and emerging alike. For its first nine years it operated at that official level and attracted little public attention. The upgrade came in 2008, when the global financial crisis prompted the first summit at the level of heads of state and government, held in Washington in November of that year, after which the leaders' summit became the group's central event. Candidates frequently confuse the two dates; the correct pairing is founded in 1999, elevated to leaders' level in 2008.
• (b)The G20 summit is held annually under the leadership of a rotating Presidency. — This statement is true as well. The G20 has no permanent secretariat, no headquarters and no charter, and it is held together instead by a presidency that rotates among the members each year. The country holding the presidency sets the agenda and the calendar of ministerial and working-group meetings, and hosts the leaders' summit that concludes its term. Continuity across years is managed by the troika, the grouping of the immediately preceding, current and incoming presidencies, which keeps an agenda from being abandoned each time the chair changes. The recent sequence illustrates how the rotation works in practice: Indonesia held the presidency in 2022, India in 2023 with the summit at New Delhi, Brazil in 2024 and South Africa in 2025. Because the statement describes the arrangement accurately, a candidate who selects it has almost certainly answered the question as though it were positive.
• (c)The G20 members represent around 85% of the global GDP. — This statement is true too, and the figure is the group's own. The G20 describes its members as representing around 85 per cent of global gross domestic product, over 75 per cent of international trade and about two-thirds of the world's population. The three numbers are worth memorising together, because a paper that does not test one of them will often test another, and because they explain what the G20 is for: a body with no treaty basis and no power to bind its members nevertheless matters because agreement among economies of that combined weight effectively settles the question for everybody else. The figures are approximate and are quoted with hedging words — 'around', 'over', 'about' — since the underlying shares shift with exchange rates and growth, and the admission of the African Union in 2023 changed them only marginally. A candidate who recalls the figure as eighty per cent or ninety should still accept a statement that says 'around 85%'.

The G20 is an informal forum for international economic cooperation. It has no charter, no treaty and no permanent secretariat, and its declarations bind nobody; what it has is the combined weight of its members, who account for around 85 per cent of world output, more than three-quarters of international trade and roughly two-thirds of the world's population. Its membership is nineteen countries plus the European Union, and since the New Delhi summit of September 2023 the African Union as well, so the name understates the number of seats. It was founded in 1999 as a meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors after the Asian financial crisis, and elevated to the level of heads of state and government in 2008 in response to the global financial crisis. Its work runs on two tracks. The finance track, led by finance ministers and central bank governors, covers the global economy, financial regulation, international financial architecture, taxation, debt and infrastructure financing. The sherpa track, led by the leaders' personal representatives, covers everything else — development, health, environment and climate, energy, trade, employment, digital economy, agriculture and anti-corruption — through a network of working groups and engagement groups that bring in business, labour, civil society, women, youth and think tanks. The presidency rotates annually and the troika of past, present and future presidencies gives the agenda continuity. The group is often contrasted with the G7, which is smaller, older and confined to advanced economies, and with the treaty-based institutions — the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization — whose reform is a standing item on the G20's own agenda.

The three current-affairs items that close this paper are exactly the kind that reward reading a newspaper with a pen. The G20 was unusually prominent in Indian public life around the time this paper was set, because India held the presidency and the summit was to be held in New Delhi, so the examiner could reasonably expect a candidate to know the basic architecture of the group. What the item actually tests, though, is not familiarity but precision, and specifically the trap in the name. 'Group of Twenty' invites the inference that there are twenty countries, and a candidate who has read a great deal of coverage without ever counting the membership will accept the statement without a second thought. The other three options are all accurate and all quotable from the group's own description of itself, which leaves the count as the only false statement in the set. This is a recurring construction in current-affairs items: three statements taken verbatim from an official source and one plausible-sounding claim about composition, numbers or dates. Note also that the position has moved since the paper was set. The African Union became a permanent member at the New Delhi summit in September 2023, so the group now has twenty-one members. That change makes the keyed statement more clearly wrong rather than less, and a card on a paper of this vintage should teach the position tested and the change together.

• The G20 consists of nineteen countries — Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Türkiye, the United Kingdom and the United States — together with the European Union, and since September 2023 the African Union as well. It has never been twenty countries.
• It was founded in 1999 as a forum of finance ministers and central bank governors, in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis, and elevated to the level of heads of state and government in 2008 in response to the global financial crisis, with the first leaders' summit held in Washington in November of that year. The two dates are frequently confused.
• G20 members represent around 85 per cent of global gross domestic product, over 75 per cent of international trade and about two-thirds of the world's population. These are the group's own approximate figures and are the numbers most often quoted in questions about its weight.
• The presidency rotates annually and the holder sets the agenda and hosts the summit. There is no permanent secretariat, so continuity is provided by the troika of the previous, current and incoming presidencies. Indonesia held the presidency in 2022, India in 2023, Brazil in 2024 and South Africa in 2025.
• The African Union was admitted as a permanent member at the New Delhi summit in September 2023, during India's presidency, taking the membership to nineteen countries and two regional organisations. The group retained its name, which is why the mismatch between the name and the membership is a standing examination point.

• Reading the name as the membership. The Group of Twenty is nineteen countries plus the European Union, and since September 2023 the African Union as well; the count of twenty has never been a count of countries, which is the single fact the item is built on.
• Missing the bold italic 'not' in the stem. Three of the four statements are accurate and quotable from the group's own material, so a candidate reading for a true statement finds one immediately and stops.
• Confusing the founding date with the date of the first leaders' summit. The G20 was founded in 1999 as a meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors and was raised to leaders' level in 2008; both dates are examined and they are often swapped.
• Rejecting an approximate figure because a slightly different number has been read somewhere. The statement says the members represent around 85 per cent of global gross domestic product, which is the group's own hedged formulation and is correct as stated.

International groupings are a standing subject in the current-affairs section of these papers, and the questions are built from a small number of testable facts: year of founding, number and identity of members, headquarters or the absence of one, how the chair or presidency is decided, the group's share of world output or population, and any recent change in membership. The commonest form is the one used here — four statements of which three are lifted from the organisation's own description and one is a plausible claim about composition or dates. A second form asks which country is or is not a member, which for the G20 usually turns on Spain, a permanent invitee rather than a member, or on a country belonging to the G7 but not the G20 or the reverse. A third asks where the most recent summit was held or who holds the presidency. Preparing means keeping a one-page card for each major grouping and updating the membership line whenever it changes, because a change in membership is the single most likely thing to be examined in the year after it happens.

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The African Union was admitted as a permanent member of the G20 at which one of the following summits?

  • (a)Rome, 2021
  • (b)Bali, 2022
  • (c)New Delhi, 2023
  • (d)Rio de Janeiro, 2024

  Answer(c) New Delhi, 2023 — the African Union was admitted as a permanent member at the summit held during India's presidency in September 2023, taking the group to nineteen countries and two regional organisations while leaving its name unchanged. Rome hosted the 2021 summit, Bali the 2022 summit under Indonesia's presidency and Rio de Janeiro the 2024 summit under Brazil's.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The G20 was founded in 1999 as a forum of which one of the following?

  • (a)Heads of state and government of the largest economies
  • (b)Finance ministers and central bank governors
  • (c)Trade ministers of developed and developing countries
  • (d)Foreign ministers of the members of the United Nations Security Council

  Answer(b) Finance ministers and central bank governors — the group was created after the Asian financial crisis as an official-level forum on the global economy and financial stability, and it operated at that level for nine years. It was elevated to the level of heads of state and government only in 2008, in response to the global financial crisis, when the first leaders' summit was held in Washington.