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February 3, 2021
IMF World Economic Outlook Update
Photo: International Monetary Fund. World Economic Outlook Update. Economic Counselor and Director of the Research Department, Gita Gopinath, delivers the World Economic Outlook at the IMF headquarters. IMF Photo/Joshua Roberts. January 26, 2021. Washington, DC, United States of America.
Photo: International Monetary Fund. Snow in Washington, DC. Pedestrians walk past the International Monetary Fund’s HQ1 and HQ2 buildings during the season’s first snow in Washington, DC. IMF Photo/Cory Hancock. December 16, 2020. Washington, DC, United States of America.
Washington, DC, January 31, 2021 / — Global growth is getting an upgrade. However, prospects for recovery are still highly uncertain due to the race between rolling out vaccines and mutations to COVID-19, the IMF says in its latest quarterly update to the World Economic Outlook report (January 20).
“We are living in highly uncertain times. We are projecting the world would grow this year instead of a severe collapse last year, but there is uncertainty. A lot depends upon the outcome of this race between a mutating virus and vaccines and how much policy support can hold up,” IMF Head of Research Gita Gopinath told reporters in a virtual briefing.
The IMF forecasts a 5.5% boost in growth in 2021, after a 3.3% drop in 2020 - the most severe hit to the global economy since the Great Depression.
But not all countries and regions are growing at the same pace, the IMF says.
The global recovery looks uneven, and the Covid-19 crisis won’t be over for anyone until it gets solved for everyone, Gopinath said. Countries need to cooperate and share resources to ensure an equitable and rapid distribution of the vaccine.
“The international community must act quickly to make sure that vaccinations and the logistics of delivery of the vaccine vaccinations are available globally to address what is currently a deeply inequitable distribution of access to vaccines across the world,” the IMF’s chief economist added.
“The health and economic arguments for this are just simply overwhelming. The new virus strain says, as we have made abundantly clear, that the pandemic is not over until it’s over everywhere. And we estimate there the benefit of more rapid progress towards ending the health crisis. It will add nine trillion dollars cumulatively to the global economy between 2020 and 2025, with benefits for all countries, including advanced economies of around four trillion dollars,” said Gopinath.
The IMF recommends that countries with fiscal space continue to use those resources to support those people and companies in need of help in the crisis.
One example many are watching: the Biden Administration and Democrat’s proposed $1.9 trillion support package could significantly boost growth. However, Gopinath said it was early days to assess its impact.
“For the U.S. economy, we have this can raise output, incomes or output in the U.S. by five percent over three years. That’s what we have estimated, including increasing growth this year by one and a quarter percent. But again, to be very clear, this is all still preliminary,” added Gopinath.
Source: IMF
|GlobalGiants.Com|
Edited & Posted by the Editor | 3:29 AM | Link to this Post
