Policy Papers
2018
March 22, 2018
Macroeconomic Developments and Prospects in Low-Income Developing Countries
Description:
This paper is the fourth in a series that examines macroeconomic developments and prospects in Low Income Developing Countries (LIDCs). LIDCs are Fund member countries where gross national income (GNI) per capita lies below a threshold level and where external financial linkages and socioeconomic indicators have not lifted them into emerging market status. There are 59 countries in the LIDC grouping, accounting for about one-fifth of the world’s population and 4 percent of global output. The paper examines macroeconomic trends across LIDCs in recent years, contrasting key features of the current situation with the period prior to the 2014 decline in commodity prices. Particular attention is given to the evolution of fiscal positions and public debt levels, including detailed analysis of the drivers of debt accumulation and the current severity of debt vulnerabilities. The analysis is grounded in, and draws on, the analysis and databases used to compile the World Economic Outlook: this report drills down into the WEO database to look in detail at the experience of LIDCs.
March 20, 2018
Overarching Strategy on Data and Statistics at the Fund in the Digital Age
Description:
The first data and statistics strategy for the Fund comes at a critical time. A fast-changing data landscape, new data needs for evolving surveillance priorities, and persisting data weaknesses across the membership pose challenges and opportunities for the Fund and its members. The challenges emerging from the digital revolution include an unprecedented amount of new data and measurement questions on growth, productivity, inflation, and welfare. Newly available granular and high-frequency (big) data offer the potential for more timely detection of vulnerabilities. In the wake of the crisis, Fund surveillance requires greater cross-country data comparability; staff and authorities face the complexity of integrating new data sources and closing data gaps, while working to address the weaknesses noted by the IEO Report (Behind the Scenes with Data at the IMF) in 2016.
The overarching strategy is to move toward an ecosystem of data and statistics that enables the Fund and its members to better meet the evolving data needs in a digital world. It integrates Fund-wide work streams on data provision to the Fund for surveillance purposes, international statistical standards, capacity development, and data management under a common institutional objective. It seeks seamless access and sharing of data within the Fund, enabling cloud-based data dissemination to support data provision by member countries (e.g., the “global data commons”), closing data gaps with new sources including Big Data, and improving assessments of data adequacy for surveillance to help better prioritize capacity development. The Fund also will work with policymakers to understand the implications of the digital economy and digital data for the macroeconomic statistics, including new measures of welfare beyond GDP.
March 16, 2018
Program Design in Currency Unions
Description:
Despite a long history of program engagement, the Fund has not developed guidance on program design in members of currency unions. The Fund has engaged with members of the four currency unions—the Central African Economic and Monetary Community, the Eastern Caribbean Currency Union, the European Monetary Union, and the West African Economic and Monetary Union—under Fund-supported programs. In some cases, union-wide institutions supported their members in undertaking adjustment under Fund-supported programs. As such, several programs incorporated—on an ad hoc basis—critical policy actions that union members had delegated. Providing general guidance on program design for members in a currency union context would fill a gap in Fund policy and help ensure consistent, transparent, and evenhanded treatment across Fund-supported programs. This paper considers two options on when and how the Fund should seek policy assurances from union-level institutions in programs of currency union members. Option 1 would involve amending the Conditionality Guidelines, which would allow the use of standard conditionality tools with respect to actions by union-level institutions. Option 2—which staff prefers—proposes formalizing current practices and providing general guidance regarding principles and modalities on policy assurances from union-level institutions in support of members’ adjustment programs. Neither option would infringe upon the independence (or legally-provided autonomy) of union-level institutions, since the institutions would decide what measures or policy actions to take—just as any independent central bank or monetary authority does, for example, in non-CU members.
February 21, 2018
Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust - 2018 Borrowing Agreement with the Banque de France
Description:
The Fund, as Trustee of the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT or Trust), has entered into a new borrowing agreement (the “Agreement”) with the Banque de France (hereafter France), effective on February 1, 2018. This new borrowing agreement with France provides new resources to the Extended Credit Facility Loan Account of the PRGT in the total amount of up to SDR 2 billion.
Pursuant to Section III, paragraph 2 of the Instrument to establish the PRGT, the Managing Director is authorized to enter into borrowing agreements and agree to their terms and conditions with lenders to the Loan Accounts of the Trust. This paper presents the new Agreement with France to the Executive Board for information.
Including this Agreement with France, the Fund has concluded fifteen new PRGT loan agreements providing total resources of SDR 11.4 billion in the context of the 2014 Board endorsed PRGT fundraising with a goal of SDR 11 billion. To accommodate the better-than-expected outcome, and following consultations with PRGT creditors, the IMF Board increased the PRGT’s cumulative borrowing limit on January 8, 2018.
This is the sixth borrowing agreement between France and the Fund as Trustee of the PRGT. The Agreement incorporates the extensions of the commitments and drawdown period for PRGT loans to end-2020 and end-2024, respectively, consistent with the Fund’s framework for concessional lending to low income countries adopted in other PRGT borrowing agreements.
February 14, 2018
Guidance Note on the Bank-Fund Debt Sustainability Framework for Low Income Countries
Description: Low-income countries (LICs) face significant challenges in meeting their Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) while at the same time ensuring that their external debt remains sustainable. In April 2005, the Executive Boards of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Development Association (IDA) approved the introduction of the Debt Sustainability Framework (DSF), a tool developed jointly by IMF and World Bank staff to conduct public and external debt sustainability analysis in low-income countries. The DSF has since been serving to help guide the borrowing decisions of LICs, provide guidance for creditors’ lending and grant allocation decisions, and improve World Bank and IMF assessments and policy advice. The latest review of the framework was approved by the Executive Boards in September 2017. This introduced reforms to ensure that the DSF remains appropriate for the rapidly changing financing landscape facing LICs and to further improve insights into debt vulnerabilities. This note provides operational and technical guidance on the implementation of the reformed framework.
February 9, 2018
Modifying the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) Cumulative Borrowing Limit
Description: An effort to mobilize SDR 11 billion in additional Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) loan resources is underway to sustain the Fund’s concessional lending operations over the medium term. SDR 9.4 billion in new loan resources have been secured to date and negotiations with remaining potential loan providers indicate that the target is likely to be exceeded by about SDR ½ to 1 billion. To accommodate the better-than-expected loan mobilization outcome, the PRGT’s cumulative borrowing limit of SDR 37 billion would need to be increased. PRGT creditors were consulted and supportive of a proposed increase in the borrowing limit, from SDR 37 billion to SDR 38 billion.
February 6, 2018
Review of the Adequacy of the Fund's Precautionary Balances
Description: This paper reviews the adequacy of the Fund’s precautionary balances, using the framework approved by the Board in 2010. The review takes place on the standard two-year cycle and assesses developments since the last review in 2016.
February 2, 2018
Implementation Plan in Response to the Board-Endorsed Recommendations for the IEO Evaluation Report - "The IMF and Social Protection"
Description:
This paper sets out Management’s response to the Independent Evaluation Office’s (IEO) report on “The IMF and Social Protection.”
The management implementation plan (MIP) proposes specific actions to address the IEO recommendations endorsed by the Executive Board in its discussion on July 19, 2017, specifically to: (i) establish a clear strategic framework to guide Fund involvement in social protection; (ii) provide tailored advice based on in-depth analysis of the particular country situation; (iii) find more realistic and effective approaches to program design and conditionality to ensure that adverse impacts of program measures on the most vulnerable are mitigated; (iv) realistically explain in external communications the IMF’s approach to social protection issues; and (v) engage actively in inter-institutional cooperation on social protection to find ways to work constructively with development partners, particularly institutions with different mandates and policy priorities. The MIP notes that the Board underscored the need to be mindful of the Fund’s mandate to engage only in macro-critical areas while bearing in mind its resource constraints and comparative expertise in implementing these recommendations.
Implementation of some of these proposed actions is already underway. The paper also explains how implementation will be monitored and the MIP’s resource implications.
January 30, 2018
Guidance Note on Letters and Statements Assessing Members’ Economic Conditions and Policies
Description: This note provides guidance on assessment letters and statements, including identifying the circumstances in which they are called for, and outlining the content, the review process, and the ground rules for circulation to the Board and for publication. Such letters or statements may be prepared for countries with programs supported by the Fund through financial assistance, a Policy Support Instrument (PSI) or Policy Coordination Instrument (PCI), countries receiving Fund emergency assistance, countries with staff-monitored programs (SMPs), or surveillance-only cases.
January 26, 2018
2017 Staff Guidance Note on the Fund's Engagement with Small Developing States
Description:
This guidance note highlights the unique economic characteristics and constraints facing small developing states. It provides operational guidance on Fund engagement with such countries, including on how small state characteristics might shape Fund surveillance and financial support, program design, capacity building activities, and collaboration with other institutions and donors.
The note updates the previous version that was published in May 2014. It incorporates modifications resulting from Board papers and related Executive Board discussions that have taken place since the March 2013 Board papers on small states, which provided the foundations of the original guidance note.
Based on these inputs, five key thematic areas (G.R.O.W.TH.) have been identified as central to the policy dialogue:
• Growth and job creation. With small states experiencing relatively weak growth since the 1990s, Fund staff working on small states should ensure an explicit focus on growth in both surveillance and program-related work.
• Resilience to shocks. Small states experience higher macroeconomic volatility and more frequent natural disasters. Staff should be ready to advise on how to tailor macroeconomic policies to provide greater resilience to shocks and climate change.
• Overall competitiveness. Options to improve relative prices may include exchange rate adjustment (where possible) or measures supportive of internal devaluation (if not), and efforts to improve the business climate, including through regional initiatives.
• Workable fiscal and debt sustainability options. With many small states having very high debt burdens, reducing debt to manageable levels requires sustained fiscal consolidation with supporting policies and structural reforms. In cases where the amount of adjustment needed to restore debt sustainability is not feasible or adequate financing is not available, debt restructuring may be needed.
• Thin financial sectors. Developing deeper and more competitive, yet sound, financial sectors contributes to macroeconomic stability and enhances the effectiveness of policy interventions while strengthening competitiveness by improving business access to financial services.
In applying this guidance, staff should continue to tailor their engagement to specific country circumstances.