WASHINGTON (AP) The world’s major economies have reached an agreement on how to measure the types of dangerous imbalances that contributed to the worst global financial downturn in seven decades.Yesterday’s deal was announced in a joint statement issued following a day of talks among finance officials from the Group of 20 rich industrial nations and major emerging markets such as China and Brazil. The effort will monitor countries and prod them to take corrective actions when imbalances in such areas as foreign trade or government debt rise to excessive levels.French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde says the agreement is a significant achievement that will maintain the momentum to revive the global economy and prevent future financial crises.After an all-night negotiating session, officials said that they had resolved key issues that had blocked implementation of a rebalancing programme. The effort will monitor the major economies and prod them to take corrective action when imbalances in such areas as foreign trade or government debt rise to excessive levels.Two G-20 officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that various objections raised by China and other countries had been resolved and this should allow the monitoring programme to go forward. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of a joint announcement by G-20 finance officials expected late yesterday.The G-20 is composed of the traditional economic powers including the United States, Japan and European nations as well as fast-growing emerging markets including China, now the world’s second largest economy, India and Brazil.After the financial crisis struck in the fall of 2008, the G-20 took over from the G-7 as the pre-eminent policy setting group for the global economy. The talks Friday were part of three days of discussions and will wrap up Saturday with meetings of the steering committees for the 187-nation International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.At a summit meeting of leaders in Pittsburgh in September 2009, the G-20 nations agreed to pursue policies to rebalance global growth in which countries such as China and Germany, which run large trade surpluses, would push for less reliance on exports and more domestic-led growth.At the same time, big deficit countries such as the United States would seek to trim huge deficits in government budgets and trade. The US deficits were seen as a major culprit in the last recession by attracting foreign capital which fuelled an unsustainable boom in housing, supported by foreign investments of sub-prime mortgages that ended up imploding and dragging down the US financial institutions.