Traditional fiscal indicators focused on measures of current deficits and debt miss the potentially important implications of current policies for future public finances. This could be problematic, including in the case of Europe, where population aging is expected to pose additional fiscal...

A Development Emergency: the title of this year's Global Monitoring Report, the sixth in an annual series, could not be more apt. The global economic crisis, the most severe since the Great Depression, is rapidly turning into a human and development crisis. No region is immune. The poor...

Fiscal policy affects sustainable development through its effects on growth, the environment, and resource development. What are the relationships between fiscal policy and sustainable development, and how does the IMF seek to promote sustainable development in its policy advice? What lessons...

This paper focuses on the increase in the external debt stock that reflects donor financing, including IMF and Bank lending to help Mongolia smooth its fiscal adjustment path after the major terms of trade shock. The fiscal deficit is expected to steadily decline until revenues from the Oyu...

Economic developments in Hungary during 1995-97 illustrate one of the most remarkable cases of macroeconomic adjustment in Europe over the last decade. Several momentous steps in the integration of the Hungarian economy with the rest of Europe and the industrial countries community took place....

This paper analyzes competitiveness in Chad since the advent of the oil era in the 2000s. Oil has since positioned itself as the key sector of a traditional economy that previously depended on agriculture and some light manufacturing. Dominated by developments in the oil sector, Chad’s balance...

Attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will require that the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries continue their considerable past achievements. The Millennium Development Goals-which were to have been met by 2015-helped focus attention on achieving progress...

In April 2006, the Executive Boards of the Bank and the Fund reviewed the debt sustainability framework (DSF) for low-income countries and the implications of the multilateral debt relief initiative. Directors thought that the DSF was broadly appropriate and that no major changes were warranted,...

Introduced in 2005, the joint IMF-World Bank Debt Sustainability Framework (DSF) is a standardized framework for conducting public and external debt sustainability analysis (DSA) in low-income countries (LICs). It aims to help guide the borrowing decisions of LICs, provide guidance for...

Diversification and structural transformation play important roles in influencing the macroeconomic performance of low-income countries (LICs). Increases in income per capita at early stages of development are typically accompanied by a transformation in a country's production and export...