Sub-Saharan Africa is facing an unprecedented health and economic crisis, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Wednesday, 15 April 2020 in its latest Regional Economic Outlook for Sub-Saharan Africa.
The crisis threatens to reverse recent development progress across the region and may weigh on growth for years to come.
“The world is facing a serious challenge, and sub-Saharan Africa will not be spared,” Abebe Aemro Selassie, Director of the IMF’s African Department said in a statement issued in Nairobi.
“The region is facing plummeting global growth, tighter financial conditions, a sharp decline in key export prices, and severe disruptions to economic activity from the measures that have had to be adopted to limit the viral outbreak. Consequently, we now project the region will shrink by on-point-six percent this year—the worst outcome on record,” he added.
Against this backdrop, Selassie called for decisive measures to limit the human and economic costs of the crisis.
IMF is now urging countries to enact policies that could include cash transfers or in-kind support to vulnerable households, including informal workers.
IMF is set to provide some US$11 billion to thirty-two sub-Saharan countries that have requested assistance in recent weeks, with disbursements to Burkina Faso, Chad, Gabon, Ghana, Madagascar, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, and Togo already made.
– APA
