Egypt to be only country with positive economic growth in MENA at 2% in 2020:IMF

CAIRO – 15 April 2020: International Monetary Fund (IMF) expected Egypt to record a growth rate of 2 percent during 2020, to be the only country that to achieve positive economic growth during the current fiscal year in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).

IMF anticipated in its World Economic Outlook report that the rest of the countries in the region would record an economic downturn due to the spread of COVID-19.

During 2021, Egypt would record real gross domestic product (GDP) of 2.8 percent, according to the report.

Meanwhile, IMF expected consumer prices in Egypt to reach 5.9 percent in 2020 and 8.2 percent in 2021, compared to 13.9 percent in 2019. As per inflation rate, it anticipated the rate to hit 10.3 in 2020 and 11.6 percent in 2021.

The report noted that current account balance would contract by 4.3 percent and 4.5 percent in 2020 and 2021, respectively.
According to the fund's data, the entire MENA region will achieve an economic contraction of 3.3 percent during 2020.

“The economy of Saudi Arabia will shrink by 2.3 percent and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) by 3.5 percent in 2020, Qatar will record a contraction of 4.3 percent, Kuwait by 1.1 percent, Oman by 2.8 percent and Algeria by 5.2 percent all this year.”

IMF expected that the Moroccan economy would shrink by 3.7 percent, Tunisia by 4.3 percent, Jordan by 3.7 percent and Lebanon by 12 percent during 2020.

The World Economic Outlook report had expected a sharp contraction of global economic growth of 3 percent this year due to the spread of the Corona virus.

“The COVID-19 pandemic is inflicting high and rising human costs worldwide, and the necessary protection measures are severely impacting economic activity. As a result of the pandemic, the global economy is projected to contract sharply by –3 percent in 2020, much worse than during the 2008–09 financial crisis,” it stated, adding that in a baseline scenario--which assumes that the pandemic fades in the second half of 2020 and containment efforts can be gradually unwound—the global economy is projected to grow by 5.8 percent in 2021 as economic activity normalizes, helped by policy support.