Business
IMF Loans: ‘83 Countries Enjoyed $165bn In 2020’
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) says it loaned 83 countries the sum of $165 billion including $16.1 billion in concessional financing to 49 low-income countries in 2020.
The Fund said this in its 2020 IMF Annual Report titled “A Year Like No Other”, released in Washington D.C on Monday.
The fund said it completed health checks on 129 countries and also supported its members in capacity development to the tune of $305 million for hands-on technical advice, policy-oriented training and peer learning.
In her message in the report, the IMF Managing Director, Kristalina Georgieva, said as the world faced a crisis like no other in 2020, the IMF and its members swung into action.
She noted that national governments took bold steps to save lives and put a floor under the world economy, with nearly $12 trillion in fiscal actions and about $7.5 trillion in monetary actions.
According to her, the package of measures endorsed as part of the quota review approved by the Board of Governors in February preserved the fund’s financial firepower.
“These measures include the doubling of the New Arrangements to Borrow and a new round of bilateral borrowing arrangements, which are expected to become effective in January 2021.
“Member countries also stepped up with essential contributions to our Catastrophe Containment and Relief Trust and Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust.
“These resources have allowed the IMF to commit over $100 billion to help members in need, since the pandemic began,” she said.
Ms Georgieva said interventions were providing low-income members with much-needed debt relief, extended until April 2021, and concessional lending, including about 10 times more such lendings, since the crisis hit than it usually disbursed in a year.
She added that the Fund’s response was comprehensive, supporting both members that entered the crisis with vulnerabilities, such as high debt, and those that had good fundamentals but needed buffers.