WASHINGTON: The Group of Seven rich nations is no longer effective and should be replaced by a steering group that includes emerging economic powers like China, India and Brazil, World Bank President Robert Zoellick said on Monday.

In a speech ahead of meetings of G7 finance leaders in Washington this weekend, Zoellick said the global financial crisis was a “wake-up call” that required broader cooperation across more countries.

“The G7 is not working,” Zoellick said, referring to the group of rich countries including the United States, Canada, Britain, Germany, France, Italy and Japan. “We need a better group for a different time.”

“The new multilateralism, suiting our times, will need to be a flexible network, not a fixed nor unitary system,” Zoellick said. “It needs to maximize the strengths of interconnecting and overlapping actors and institutions, public and private,” he said.

He said the steering group should include finance ministers from China, India, Brazil, South Africa, Saudi Arabia and Russia. It should not, however, be limited to any set number of countries but should be flexible and evolve with the times.

Zoellick has announced he will form a commission led by former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo to help modernize the World Bank’s governance structure, long dominated by the United States and Europeans.

For the reforms Zoellick envisions to replace the G7, the group would bring together over 70 percent of the world’s gross domestic product, 56 percent of the world population, 62 percent of global energy production, the world’s major carbon emitters, big donor countries, and the main players in global capital, commodity, and exchange rate markets.

The new system would respect state sovereignty but require a “sense of shared responsibility,” he said.

Zoellick said the group should meet regularly, either in person or via videoconferencing, and may need back up from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to identify emerging problems and solutions.

Zoellick, who has served in high-ranking foreign and economic policy posts under three Republican presidents, said the next U.S. president would have to move beyond the firefight of financial stabilization and would need to work with other countries.

He has warned that the “double jeopardy” of higher food and fuel prices and now the financial crisis could be a tipping point for developing countries and could push 100 million people deeper into poverty.