IMF forecasts 1.5% growth in Tunisian economy for 2019

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) presented its report on the World Economic Outlook 2019 (WOE) on Tuesday in Washington on the fringes of the Annual Meetings held from October 14 to 20.

Presented by Gita Gopinath, Chief Economist of the IMF, the report provides a decline in global growth forecasts for 2019 amid trade tensions and the slowdown in the Chinese economy. “Global growth is not expected to exceed 3% this year, the slowest pace since the 2009 financial crisis,” said Gopinath.  It is 0.3 percentage points less than the latest IMF forecast published in April. Last year the world growth reached 3.6%.

According to IMF forecasts, Tunisia’s economic growth should not exceed 1.5% in 2019, compared to 2.5% in 2018. As for the current account deficit, it was expected to stand at -10.4% compared to -11.1% in 2018.

In 2020, the monetary institution forecasts growth of 2.4% and a deficit in the account balance -9.4%.

At the global level, according to Gopinath, economic tensions, which have led to an increase in tariffs, are expected to cost 0.8 percentage points of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to the global growth in 2020.

She added that the decline in demand for intermediate products had weighed on world trade, which grew by no more than 1% in the first half of 2019, the slowest rate since 2012.

As for emerging and developing countries, they would post a growth of 3.9% while developed countries would reach a growth of 1.7%.

In 2020, global growth is expected to improve slightly to 3.4%, corresponding to a downward revision of 0.2% of April’s forecasts. This acceleration is due to a weaker recovery or recession in troubled emerging countries, such as Turkey, Argentina and Iran.

TunisianMonitorOnline/Translated from an article by Omar El Oudi, Editor-in-Chief and Correspondent of ilboursa.com for the International Monetary Fund’s Media Fellowship Program to cover the Annual Meetings of the World Bank and IMF in Washington, DC.

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