Story by Stanley James
Zimbabwe will be taking part at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank 2023 Spring Meetings next week as the second republic forges ahead in mending ties with multilateral institutions.
An IMF and World Bank statement shows that the 2023 Spring Meetings will also be attended by the Minister of Finance and Economic Development, Professor Mthuli Ncube, and Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe Governor, Dr John Mangudya.
Zimbabwe’s representatives are also expected to attend a series of meetings with global business people, the academia, and top officials from the IMF and the World Bank in Washington D.C, USA.
The 2023 Spring Meetings, which will run from April 10 to 16 this year, will also focus on how global shocks such as geopolitical tensions, uncertainties, international commodity price fluctuations, the COVID-19 are leading to reduced growth.
For Zimbabwe, the meetings provide a platform to learn from other global economies, share current experiences, and an opportunity to negotiate credit lines from global banks.
Despite not having accessed any loans and grants, Zimbabwe has never looked back and has pursued several platforms to strengthen relations with the Bretton Woods institutions.
Through economic reforms, the government has even scaled up the re-engagement and engagement agenda with multilateral financiers by adopting an external debt clearance roadmap.
Even the IMF has renewed interest in Zimbabwe, with its team of experts regularly visiting the country to assess the economy and offer technical support.
The IMF and World Bank have also in the past three years been charmed by the positive results of economic reforms, thereby endorsing yearly positive growth projections for the country.
Zimbabwe also received 961 million United States dollars in Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) from the IMF in 2021 under a 650 billion United States dollar facility distributed to its members in mitigating the devastating effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
