Africa
THE International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said African governments must embrace policies that will combat rising inflations in their economies.
Kristalina Georgieva, the IMF Managing Director, made this known on Thursday in Cote d’Ivoire, during a curtain raiser speech in preparation for the 2023 World Bank annual meetings slated for October 9 to 15, in Marrakesh, Morocco.
Georgieva said, “I have some good news for Africa. We are advancing a preparation to have a third representative of sub-Saharan Africa in our executive board. Ultimately, what it will mean is a stronger voice for Africa.
She said growth in sub-Sahara Africa decelerated in 2023 to 3%. “The impact of the war (in Ukraine) was devastating, especially coming on top of Covid,” she said.
“Countries with limited fiscal capacity were particularly severely impacted.” Inflation, which soared in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, caused “additional hardship on people,” Georgieva added.
She said, “We expect some brighter prospect for sub-Saharan Africa in 2024. But it is hard. We still see that food prices are particularly high and that translates into (a) terrible fate of 144 million people having difficulty into feeding themselves or their families,” she said.
“What we want is countries to win the fight against inflation. It’s not going to happen if we throw more money without the good fundamentals for the economy to run efficiently.”
Instead of subsidies, she said, “What we are strongly recommending is… to give direct support to the poorer part of the population.”
While the IMF has continued to provide special assistance since the Covid pandemic broke out, including through zero-interest loans, she said she would ask nations and the private sector to “do more” to help developing countries. (vanguard)
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-October 06, 2023 @ 13:45 GMT |
Tags: International Monetary Fund Kristalina Georgieva
