This is more than double the average stimulus spending for the G20 countries. The next big spender on stimulus is the United States, pumping in 1.9 percent of GDP this year and 2.9 percent next year. It is followed by China, pumping in 2 percent of GDP this year and next.

The laggards are the other Group of Seven countries, the Europeans and Japan. Italy is contributing a mere 0.2 percent this year and 0.1 percent next year. France offers 0.7 percent this year and zero next year. Britain offers 1.4 percent this year and zero next year. Germany does rather better with 1.5 percent of GDP this year and 2 percent next year. Japan offers 1.4 percent this year and 0.4 percent next year.

"The fiscal stimulus currently planned is expected to have a considerable impact on G20 growth in 2009 -- on the order of 0.5 (percent) to 1.25 percent," the IMF concludes. Note that the IMF also expects global GDP to contract by 0.5 percent this year, so the stimulus packages may help the global economy stay flat rather than shrink yet further, but with wide differences among the various states.

"Among the advanced economies, the growth impact is expected to be highest in Canada, Germany, Japan, Korea and the United States. Among the emerging economies, China, Russia and South Africa are expected to receive the most significant boost to growth," the IMF says.

Ominously for those who see the first green shoots of recovery coming later this year or early next year, the IMF adds, "In 2010, under current information regarding the size of fiscal packages, the growth effect would be minimal, but would obviously increase should countries adopt additional measures."

In fairness to the Europeans, their still generous welfare state system, with automatic unemployment benefits and free healthcare and housing support for the unemployed, will increase public spending and act as a stimulus, even though the IMF figures do not take this into account. And the British, with a much larger financial sector in the City of London, are putting the bulk of their funds into stabilizing their banking system. And in fairness to the United States, the IMF calculation does not include the proposed new budget of President Obama, with its $1.7 trillion deficit, since this has yet to get through the Congress and be enacted.

Still, the overall impression of the IMF analysis is that expectations of the G20 summit should not be set too high. It looks unlikely to produce a coordinated new global stimulus plan, just as China this week disappointed the markets that had risen in expectation that last week's opening session of China's top legislature, the National People's Congress, would see new stimulus measures. But in a TV address Premier Wen Jiabao promised to do whatever is needed for China to grow at an annual rate of 8 percent this year. This looks an unrealistically optimistic target, given the sharp fall in world trade and the recession eroding demand in the United States and Europe.

But expectations of the G20 will be much higher, not only because all the world's leading developed and emerging economies will be present, but also because it will amount to Obama's first high-profile appearance on the international stage. Lasting a week, it will be his first major foreign trip, taking in London (on April Fool's Day as well as the April 2 summit) and then France and Germany at the border city of Strasbourg. Since the Czechs currently hold the rotating presidency of the European Union Council, the trip ends in the Czech capital of Prague.

Former Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating, for example, has called on the summit to produce "a new global economic and political settlement, a new paradigm to resuscitate the world financial and economic system." Others want it to lay the foundations for a new global compact on climate change. Yet more are calling for a massive refinancing of the IMF to enable it to bail out developing countries in dire financial trouble, and most participants expect the summit to agree to a tough new list of regulations for the financial system to prevent future banking crises.

Most of these expectations probably will be disappointed. There remain wide philosophical gaps between U.S. and European attitudes toward financial regulation, and China and India are signaling no great readiness for climate change to even be on the agenda. The most that realistically can be hoped for will be a clear statement of the G20 leaders' political will to resist protectionist measures and to establish the G20 as a permanent new body of global governance, far more representative than the old G7. British and U.S. officials also hope for an agreement to recapitalize the IMF by up to $150 billion.

The markets may deem this to be inadequate, in which case they will slump again. Aware of this prospect, some of the officials currently negotiating the preliminary agreements are hopeful of more stimulus measures being announced by Europe and Japan. But one outcome looks almost certain. Despite all the harsh commentary on Japan's "lost decade" of no growth in the 1990s, the Japanese GDP never shrank during that period. The rest of the G20 nations, with the exception of Saudi Arabia, are unlikely to be so lucky this year.

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