who do not represent a political party, but a particular field of expertise : business, banking or economics. ” one example of an existing body of this type is the swedish fiscal policy council, which was established in 2007 as an agency under the government. in the uk, an interim office for budget responsibility ( obr ) was recently set up. and in the euro area, the budgetary surveillance of the european commission is referred to as the “ preventive arm ” of the stability and growth pact. but, as highlighted by the commission itself : “ in order to function effectively, it requires a common understanding of the economic and fiscal policy challenges in the european union, and a strong political commitment to addressing them. ” how to enforce a strong political commitment to address the fiscal bias is still very much an unresolved question. the second question is how to secure adequate international coordination in both crisis prevention and crisis resolution. international coordination is important as the chart shows, foreign banks ’ share of the market in norway is approximately 1 / 3. in some countries, foreign banks ’ share of the market is higher or even 100 %, with no domestic banks at all. today a bank ’ s regulation is laid down and supervised by the authorities in the bank ’ s home country. when foreign banks ’ share in a market is large, this challenges the concept of a level playing field insofar as national supervisory authorities do not coordinate their work. this way of organizing regulation will be an even bigger challenge when new regulation designed to hinder the build - up of systemic risk is introduced, since a host country and the home countries of banks operating in the host country may be in different stages of the business cycle. output gap in the nordic countries this is illustrated in this chart showing output gaps in the nordic countries. today most economies are closely integrated with other economies, both through trade and through financial markets. still there may be significant differences both in the timing ( and amplitude ) of peaks and troughs in the business cycle and in the functioning of financial markets. asymmetries between countries mean that the appropriate regulatory parameters to dampen systemic risk will not necessarily be the same for all countries at the same time. to be effective, regulatory parameters, for instance those calibrated to ensure the buildup of countercyclical buffers, need to encompass all banks operating in the same jurisdiction, as put forward in the july 2010 bis proposal. finally, i will say a few words on crisis resolution. resolution

and seeks to stabilise economic developments in the short and medium term will also contribute to promoting regional development. long - term economic developments consumer prices and economic growth in norway and sweden moved on a fairly similar path during the years around the dissolution of the union and up to the beginning of the 1970s. there are several reasons for this. first, we have been part of and been influenced by the same international business cycles. second, we have close trade relations, even if there were setbacks during the interwar period and the two world wars. third, both countries participated in various fixed exchange rate systems for long periods. after world war ii, we adhered to the international fixed exchange rate system bretton woods. during the period 1900 to 1970, the norwegian and swedish economy grew at an average annual rate of 3. 2 and 3. 3 per cent respectively. with norway ’ s emergence as an oil nation, a change occurred. the norwegian economy continued to grow at about the same pace. from 1970 to date, the norwegian economy has expanded by an report no. 39 ( 1983 ) : act on norges bank and the monetary system annual average of 3. 4 per cent. the development of the petroleum sector and the use of petroleum revenues contributed to relatively high growth also in the mainland economy. in sweden, however, growth fell to an annual average of 2 per cent. business sector competitiveness in norway after norway became an oil nation, competitiveness in the business sector in norway deteriorated in relation to sweden. first, wage growth in norway has been somewhat higher than in sweden. second, the value of the norwegian krone against the swedish krona has appreciated sharply. the rise in labour costs in local and common currency was particularly high in the mid - 1980s and after 1997. hourly labour costs for a swedish manufacturing worker were on average 8 per cent higher than for a norwegian manufacturing worker in 1980 measured in common currency. in 2004, however, hourly labour costs for a swedish manufacturing worker was almost 20 per cent lower2. competitiveness in norway ’ s manufacturing industry is now close to 20 per cent weaker than the average for the past 30 years. norwegians had to pay close to 138 norwegian kroner for 100 swedish kronar in 1970. today, we only have to pay a little more than 90 norwegian kroner. the appreciation of the norwegian krone has made it less expensive to buy goods and services in sweden. during longer periods, the exchange rate seems to have been