China should let its currency rise to cool inflation and help ease economic distortions as it emerges from the global crisis, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said Tuesday.

The recommendation comes amid pressure from Washington and other trading partners for Beijing to ease controls that they say keep its yuan undervalued and give its exporters an unfair price advantage, swelling its trade surplus.

A stronger currency, coupled with more social spending, could help to reduce China's high savings rate, boost consumer spending power and narrow its trade surplus, the 30-member OECD club of industrialized nations said in an economic survey.

"It is appropriate for the exchange rate to appreciate," said Pier Carlo Padoan, the group's deputy secretary-general, at a news conference.

China broke the yuan's direct link with the dollar in 2005 and allowed it to rise by about 20 percent over the next three years. But that stopped in late 2008 as Beijing tried to keep Chinese exporters competitive amid plunging global demand.