South Africa must continue with the stimulus package it has adopted as a response to the financial crisis, Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan said on Sunday.

He was addressing a briefing at OR Tambo airport after returning from the Group of 20 (G20) Finance Ministers' meeting in London.

"South Africa must continue with its infrastructure spending," Gordhan said, adding that stimulus packages globally had to remain in place until recovery was secured.

"If countries withdraw their stimulus packages now, there will be a setback," he said.

Gordhan said G20 countries, however, remained committed to the formulation of a credible exit strategy which would be underpinned by effective coordination between fiscal and monetary authorities, international co-operation and communication among countries regarding policy actions.

"Exits out of the stimulus packages will differ from country to country," the Finance Minister said.

He added that there was "cautious hope" for recovery.

"There are indications that the green shoots are real as we see India, Japan, France and Germany working their way out of technical recession." While some countries were recovering well, others were lagging.

"Asia is doing well but Africa is a mixed picture," Gordhan said.

There was a global danger that as credit lines began to work properly again, bankers would try to "go back to normal." Gordhan emphasised that there was "no going back to the old kind of normal." .

This, he said, was the key message the G20 was sending.

"Lobbies are developing in structures such as the Financial Stability Board (FSB) that stringent capital requirements would be required for risky trading. The FSB will report to the G20 summit in Pittsburgh later this month." Gordhan said the G20 would also focus on tax havens.

"The deadline for information exchange mechanisms is March 2010 - if these are not in place the G20 will take action against those tax havens."

Turning to reforms in major institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Gordhan said his predecessor Trevor Manuel had been lobbying for changes in these institutions for some time.

"South Africa supports the decision of the G20 to promptly implement the April 2008 quota reform package.

"We also support further reforms to improve the quota share of emerging countries in both the IMF and the World Bank."

Gordhan said South Africa supported the move to a more open, transparent and merit-based approach to choose the heads of the IMF and World Bank.

The two-day meeting in London had been "eventful" and there had been "a lot of progress made."

Referring specifically to South Africa, Gordhan said there was cautious hope for recovery but a long hard road lay ahead.

"However, if we manage the situation as we have with fiscal and monetary policy measures, South Africa will end up in a better place."