Sub-Saharan Africa is projected to grow by 3.6 percent in 2022, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said.
The IMF, in its latest Regional Economic Outlook for Africa on Saturday, announced that the economic growth will see over one percentage point slower than 2021.
The IMF blamed worldwide slowdown, tighter financial conditions, and volatile commodity prices to the decline in economic growth.
Rising food and energy prices are striking at the region’s most vulnerable, and public debt and inflation are at highest levels in decades, said the IMF’s outlook released on Friday.
“Late last year, sub-Saharan Africa appeared to be on a strong recovery path out of a long-running pandemic,” said Abebe Aemro Selassie, Director of the IMF’s African Department.
“Unfortunately, this progress has been abruptly interrupted by turmoil in global markets, placing further pressures on policymakers in the region,” Aemro-Selassie pointed out.
The Outlook said the region is expected to grow by 3.6 percent in 2022, down from 4.7 percent in 2021, due to muted investment and the overall worsening of its balance of trade.
Non-resource-intensive countries, which enjoy a more diverse economic structure, will continue to be among the region’s more dynamic and resilient economies, according to the outlook.
They will grow by 4.6 percent in 2022, compared to 3.3 percent in oil exporters and 3.1percent in other resource-intensive countries.
MG/as/APA