Instead of huge bailouts, a blue-ribbon panel of experts wants the International Monetary Fund to make more modest loans to countries that encounter financial difficulties. A task force of the Council on Foreign Relations made the surprising recommendations -- which fly in the face of current policy.

Here are some of the group's suggestions:

• Rather than the multibillion dollar rescue loans the IMF has made in recent years, it should provide less ambitious public financing so that the recipient country could restore its access to long-term private money.

• The IMF should provide loans at more generous terms to countries whose economic policies are judged worthy.

• Countries should follow Chile's example and tax the inflow of short-term foreign capital -- so as not to gorge themselves with these loans and then be plunged into crisis when nervous lenders snatch their money back.

Source: Damian Milverton, "Task Force Says IMF Should Avoid Big Loans," Wall Street Journal, September 20, 1999.