The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has projected a rise in theunemployment ratio for Pakistan from 4.5 percent in 2020 to 5.1 percent in2021.
The IMF World Economic Outlook (WEO) report “A long and difficult Ascent”,projected the GDP growth rate for Pakistan at 1 percent for 2021 against-0.4 percent in 2020.
The Fund has projected the inflation rate at 8.8 percent for 2021 against10.7 percent in 2020. The current account balance is projected at negative2.5 percent for 2021 compared to negative 1.1 percent for 2020.
The World Bank (WB) has projected Pakistan’s GDP growth rate 0.5 percent,inflation rate at 9 percent, and the current account balance at a negative1.5 percent of GDP.
IMF further stated that remittance flows contracted sharply during theearly lockdown period but have shown signs of recovery. Nonetheless, therisk of a decline in payments and transfers from migrant workers back totheir home countries is very significant, particularly for such countriesas Bangladesh, Egypt, Guatemala, Pakistan, the Philippines, and those insub-Saharan Africa more broadly.
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The International Monetary Fund turned slightly positive on the globaleconomy for this year, but warned of a “long, uneven and uncertain”recovery.
The global economy is now projected to contract by 4.4% in 2020 — an upwardrevision from an estimate of -4.9% made in June (which has now also beenrevised to -5.2% due to a new methodology used by the IMF).
The IMF’s forecast assumes that social distancing due to the coronaviruspandemic will continue into 2021, and that local transmission will falleverywhere by the end of 2022.
