Credit:  britannica.com/ ulldellebre—iStock/Thinkstock /  Mosque of Djenné, Mali.

By  Gary Raynaldo

DIPLOMATIC  TIMES

The International Monetary Fund (IMF)  Thursday approved a disbursement of US$200 million to west Africa nation Mali under the Rapid Credit Facility (RCF) to address the COVID-pandemic.  According to the  IMF, the COVID-19 shock hit the Malian economy hard amid an already challenging social and security  situation. The economic outlook has deteriorated significantly, and growth is expected to slow to below 1 percent, increasing already high unemployment and poverty.  The IMF said the  authorities  in the Republic of Mali responded quickly with measures to contain the spread of the virus and to mitigate its social and economic impact. These emergency measures, along with the economic slowdown, will increase the fiscal deficit and the country’s financing needs, the  global lending organization said. 

“The COVID-19 pandemic is having a large adverse impact on Mali’s economic growth and public health, adding to the existing security challenges. The decline in economic activity, spillovers from global trade and financing shocks, along with fiscal measures to combat the crisis have created an urgent balance-of-payments and fiscal financing needs.”

-Mitsuhiro Furusawa,  IMF Deputy Managing Director and Acting Chair.

Furusawa said the crisis and the policy response will lead to a temporary widening of the fiscal deficit, and that the authorities are taking measures to limit fiscal pressures through reprioritization of spending plans, but large additional financing will be needed to preserve macroeconomic stability and development gains.  There has been a steady rise in COVID-19 cases in Mali since the first two cases were recorded on March 24, 2020, and most recently risen to 482 confirmed  positive cases, most of them within Bamako, the capital city with approximately 25 deaths thus far.