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Africa

You are looking at 1–10 of 6,625 items for
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Cover Technical Assistance Reports
Kingdom of Lesotho: Technical Assistance Report-Public Investment Management Assessment - PIMA
International Monetary Fund. Fiscal Affairs Dept.
This report presents the findings of the Public Investment Management Assessment (PIMA) and conducted for Lesotho at the request of the Ministry of Finance. Lesotho has sustained high public investment, but weak execution, declining capital stock, and low efficiency mean this spending has not translated into durable infrastructure or stronger growth. The central challenge facing Lesotho is therefore not the volume of public investment, but the effectiveness with which investment spending is planned, allocated, and implemented. This PIMA finds system-wide weaknesses across the public investment cycle, especially in project appraisal, budgeting, funding predictability, procurement, and portfolio management despite some formal arrangements being in place. To enhance investment efficiency, the report recommends raising absorption capacity by operationalizing the procurement law, improving funding predictability for ongoing projects, strengthening appraisal and selection, aligning capital budgeting with project costs, better reallocation and improving portfolio monitoring.
Keywords:
Public investment management; infrastructure governance; public financial management; investment efficiency; PIMA; Lesotho.
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Mauritius: 2026 Article IV Consultation-Press Release; Staff Report; Staff Supplement; and Statement by the Executive Director for Mauritius
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
Weaker Macroeconomic Conditions and Policy Challenges. Mauritius continues to benefit from resilient economic activity, supported by tourism and financial services, but is now operating under weaker macroeconomic conditions amid a more adverse and uncertain external environment. High public debt, widening external imbalances, rising age-related spending pressures, substantial climate-adaptation and infrastructure needs, and weak productivity underscore the need to recalibrate the macroeconomic policy mix to rebuild buffers and strengthen macroeconomic resilience.
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Mauritius: Selected Issues
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
Selected Issues
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
The Gambia: 2026 Article IV Consultation, Fifth Review Under the Extended Credit Facility Arrangement, Requests for Program Extension, Augmentation and Rephasing of Access Under the Extended Credit Facility, Requests for Waivers of Non-Observance of Performance Criteria, Modification of Performance Criteria, Financing Assurances Review, Second Review Under the Resilience and Sustainability Facility Arrangement, and Request for Extension and Rephasing of Access Under the Resilience and Sustainability Facility-Press Release; Staff Report; and Statement by the Executive Director for The Gambia
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
The Gambia is highly vulnerable to external and climate shocks. The war in the Middle East is negatively impacting the country’s economic activity, inflation, tourism, and remittance flows. Presidential elections are scheduled for December 2026. Exposure to climate risks is significant.
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
The Gambia: Selected Issues
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
Selected Issues
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia: Fifth Review Under the Extended Credit Facility Arrangement, Request for Rephasing of Access, Modification of Indicative Targets, and Financing Assurances Review-Press Release; Staff Report; and Statement by the Executive Director for The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.
In July 2024, the Board approved a four-year arrangement under the Extended Credit Facility to support the Ethiopian authorities’ Homegrown Economic Reform agenda (HGER), which aims to correct macroeconomic imbalances, restore debt sustainability, and lay the foundations for high, private sector-led growth. Progress under HGER continues, with better-than-anticipated macroeconomic outcomes to date. However, the Middle East war represents a significant external shock that is generating short-term financing pressures. Thus, maintaining positive macro momentum will require adroit responses to emerging challenges and continued effort to strengthen the foundations for private sector-led growth.
Cover Technical Notes and Manuals
BigTech in Financial Services: Emerging Regulatory Considerations
Parma Bains
,
Gabriela E Conde
,
Nobuyasu Sugimoto
, and
Caroline Wu
Large technology firms (BigTech) are increasingly expanding into consumer-facing financial services, particularly payments, credit, insurance, asset management, and financial SuperApps. While their current financial stability implications remain limited in most jurisdictions, rapid growth, especially in emerging market and developing economies, raises new conduct, prudential, and systemic risks. This paper analyzes BigTech business models, key activities, and associated risks, and assesses the adequacy of existing regulatory frameworks. It discusses practical options for supervisors to enhance risk identification, strengthen sector-based and group-wide supervision, expand the regulatory perimeter, improve data protection frameworks, and reinforce domestic and international coordination. No global financial standards apply specifically to BigTech. Given the cross-border nature of BigTech activities, global standards should be developed to facilitate internationally consistent regulation and effective cross-border cooperation.
Keywords:
BigTech; BNPL; conglomerate; emerging market and developing economies; financial stability; fintech; systemic risk; insurance; credit; payments; asset management; regulation; supervision; IMF Technical Notes; emerging market; Monetary and Capital Markets Department; risk identification; BigTech firm; Financial sector stability; Global; South America; Central America; Caribbean
Cover Selected Issues Papers
Policy Transmission Through Banking: Evidence from Namibia
Yumeng Gu
This paper estimates the strength of monetary policy transmission to bank lending and deposit rates in Namibia under a pegged exchange rate regime. Using local projections, it quantifies the pass-through of domestic and South African policy rates to aggregate banking interest rates. The results show that the pass-through is primarily driven by the South African Reserve Bank policy rate, while the effects of domestic policy rates are weaker and less persistent. Transmission is also asymmetric: lending rates adjust rapidly and completely, reflecting the prevalence of variable-rate contracts and their linkage to prime rate, while deposit rates respond more slowly and incompletely, consistent with differences in funding structures and pricing behavior across banks.
Keywords:
Monetary policy; interest rate pass-through; bank lending rates; bank deposit rates; Namibia; pegged exchange rate regime
Cover Selected Issues Papers
Analyzing Social Spending in Namibia
Hannah C Brown
,
Hajime Takizawa
, and
Qianqian Zhang
This paper analyzes social spending in Namibia across education, health, and social protection. It assesses spending adequacy relative to development needs and examines whether resources are effectively translated into social outcomes. The analysis finds that spending levels compare favorably with peers, but efficiency gaps remain across sectors. In education and health, outcomes lag behind those achieved in some countries with comparable spending levels, while social assistance programs face coverage and targeting challenges. Policies to improve allocative efficiency could strengthen social outcomes while supporting fiscal sustainability.
Keywords:
Social spending; spending efficiency; education; health; social assistance; fiscal sustainability; human capital; Namibia
Cover Technical Assistance Reports
Kingdom of Eswatini: Technical Assistance Report-Report on the Monetary and Financial Statistics Technical Assistance Mission (May 12–23, 2025)
International Monetary Fund. Statistics Dept.
The mission assisted the Central Bank of Eswatini (CBE) in expanding the coverage of monetary and financial statistics (MFS) in line with the 2016 Monetary and Financial Statistics Manual and Compilation Guide (2016 MFSMCG), especially with the addition of other financial corporations (OFCs)—pension funds, insurance corporations, and non-deposit-taking credit providers—which accounted for about 66.2 percent of financial sector assets (excluding the CBE). It also expanded the coverage of other depository corporations’ MFS to include deposit-taking savings and credit cooperative organizations (SACCOs). The mission further incorporated the expanded MFS data into a Balance Sheet Approach (BSA) matrix, noting the need for complementary balance sheet data for external and government sectors to support regular and comprehensive BSA analysis.
Keywords:
Kingdom of Eswatini; Monetary and financial statistics; 2016 MFSMCG; Other financial corporations; Other depository corporations; Balance sheet approach.