In recent years, the IMF has released a growing number of reports and other documents covering economic and financial developments and trends in member countries. Each report, prepared by a staff team after discussions with government officials, is published at the option of the member country

KEY ISSUES Context. High oil prices and increased production have enabled the government to continue to record high fiscal and external surpluses and build strong buffers. Large infrastructure investments are expected to support the growth momentum. Outlook and risks. Overall real non-oil gross...

This Selected Issues paper estimates the optimal allocation of government current spending, precautionary saving, and investment for Kuwait under uncertainty. The results show that in the face of high oil income volatility and the expected decline in oil prices, projected current spending...

Macroeconomic conditions deteriorated in 2012. Growth slowed to 2.7 percent from 5 percent in 2011. Both the external and fiscal deficits widened significantly, to 10 percent and 7.6 percent of GDP, respectively. The 2012 fiscal outcome entailed a significant slippage from the authorities’...

This Selected Issues paper analyzes energy price reform in Kuwait. It emphasizes that Kuwait should take advantage of current low global energy prices to strengthen efforts to reform domestic energy prices. In the longer term, this would benefit growth by increasing efficiency in the economy and...