In 2024, global employment expanded in line with a growing labour force, keeping the global unemployment rate steady at 5 per cent, similar to that of 2023. Slowing productivity growth remains a major bottleneck with respect to expanding the opportunities for decent work. On the back of stable unemployment rates, …
Investment is an important driver of economic growth with important implications for debt sustainability. Investment efficiency gaps adversely impact debt sustainability in Africa. The current heightened fiscal vulnerabilities can be attributed to external factors including volatile commodity prices particularly for commodity-exporting countries and health challenges like COVID-19 pandemic that weakened …
Central African governments introduced several socioeconomic measures after COVID-19 first surfaced. CEMAC countries and the Democratic Republic of Congo enacted stimulus measures equivalent to several percentage points of GDP, combining tax relief and liquidity injections with spending for public health measures and social sectors. These have varied by country depending …
Assuming the COVID-19 pandemic ends or that successful vaccination programs are implemented, Southern Africa is projected to grow 3.2 percent in 2021 and 2.4 percent in 2022. But this recovery will be inadequate given the region’s estimated 6.3 percent contraction in 2020. Slow growth in South Africa—the region’s largest economy—has …
Real gross domestic product growth in North Africa was largely negative in 2020, at -1.1% with a -5.1 percentage point drop over 2019, the African Development Bank’s 2021 edition of the North Africa Economic Outlook reports. Released on November 3, the report finds that in 2020, North African economies experienced …
This report reviews the economic performance of the 13 countries under the African Development Bank’s East Africa Regional Development and Business Delivery Office: Burundi, Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Seychelles, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, and Uganda. East Africa is the only region in Africa that avoided a recession …
This report complements the African Development Bank’s African Economic Outlook 2021, providing more detail on West Africa’s economic situation and growth prospects in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. It also analyzes public debt in West African countries and explores financing options. Finally, the report provides recommendations for facilitating sovereign …
Africa is severely impacted by the triple crisis of debt, climate change and nature loss. The continent’s debt now stands at more than 70% of GDP. There is potential to address these crises through ‘general purpose’ debt financing linked to climate and nature key performance indicators (KPIs). For severely indebted …
The study provides a critical assessment of the implications of COVID-19 pandemic on the country’s fiscal consolidation path and identify alternative policy options for mitigating the high risk of debt distress. The study customizes the Middle Income Countries Debt Sustainability Analysis (MIC DSA) model by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) …
The National Statistical Office (NSO), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation has conducted the latest survey on All India Debt & Investment Survey during the period January – December, 2019 as a part of 77th round of National Sample Survey (NSS). Prior to this the survey was carried out in …
The COVID-19 crisis, which has sent economies in South Asia and around the world into a deep recession, has highlighted South Asia’s rising debt levels and sizable hidden liabilities. State-owned enterprises, state-owned commercial banks, and public-private partnerships have been at the center of the rising debt wave and the latest …
The COVID-19 pandemic has worsened the debt vulnerabilities of many low- and medium-income sovereigns. Debt levels were already high for many even prior to COVID outbreak, but are now exacerbated because government revenues have declined as a result of limited economic activity – while the timing and the quantum of …
Around 1 in 8 countries globally spends more on debt than on social services, according to a UNICEF report. COVID-19 and the Looming Debt Crisis notes that 25 countries globally – the majority of them already burdened by poverty and deprivation – spent a higher proportion of total government expenditure …
The triple COVID-19, economic, and climate crisis poses a growing challenge to debt sustainability and financing for climate action. There are growing calls to look for solutions for the three crisis together, notably through “debt-for-climate” swaps. Though not a general panacea, such proposals may represent an attractive option for both …
The African Economic Outlook is the African Development Bank’s flagship annual publication. It provides economic data as well as analysis and recommendations for the continent’s economies. Each edition focuses on a contemporary theme. The 2021 theme From debt resolution to growth: the road ahead for Africa highlights the impact of …
This study provides an analysis of the linkages between multi-hazard exposure, lack of resilience, resulting disaster risk with related loss and damage, sovereign debt risks, and the lack of investment into resilience building. The COVID-19 pandemic has come on top of the climate crisis, the existential threat of our time. …
The Debt-for-Climate Initiative (DCI) is an effort to provide comprehensive debt relief for eligible countries to generate fiscal space for climate action. The DCI aims at achieving maximum creditor and debtor participation. The DCI consists of three pillars. The first pillar involves debt-stock relief for countries with an unsustainable level …
Low-income countries (LICs) are suffering from triple distresses: the mortal impact of Covid-19, increasing debt burdens, and climate change impacts. Obviously, they are all suffering from a liquidity crunch because of competing national priorities. In the near term, adequate adaptation finance for climate-proofing development and enhancing the resilience of societies …
South Africa’s economy, which was already in a precarious state before Covid-2019, has been tipped into full blown crisis by the pandemic. Gross na-tional government debt is expected to be upwards of 86% within two years. Eskom, which is the country’s state-owned monopolistic and vertically integrated electricity utili-ty, is a …
Even before COVID-19, fears were growing over developing country debt, which had surpassed US$8 trillion by the end of 2019. The pandemic has made the situation much worse as its economic impact pushes millions more women, children and men in these countries into poverty. This paper shows how, as part …
The deaths due to accidents have been classified into two broad groups - accidental deaths due to causes attributable to nature and accidental deaths due to causes not attributable to nature. Causes attributable to nature include avalanche, cold and exposure, tornado, earthquake, epidemic, flood, heat stroke, landslide, lightning, torrential rain …
