This paper explores the macroeconomic implications of the COVID-19 pandemic in the WAMZ and discusses measures that could be employed to mitigate the adverse economic effects of the pandemic to preserve the gains already achieved towards regional integration. It identifies the channels through...

The increasing uncertainties about the evolving pattern of the novel COVID-19 virus in the absence of a vaccine and the dampening economic effects associated with the containment measures, which have triggered a sharp fall in global commodity prices have raised concerns among policymakers in the...

WAMZ countries have accumulated high levels of public debt less than two decades after the massive debt forgiveness effected under the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative. This has raised sustainability concerns as rising debt levels have the potential to create negative spillover...

This study provides country-specific empirical evidence on the optimal inflation-growth threshold in the WAMZ over the period 1996-2021. Although there is large empirical literature on this subject, however, previous studies on the WAMZ economies generally focused on exogenous approaches of...

While previous studies have explored the relationship between inflation and economic growth, the existing literature on threshold effect of inflation on economic growth in the West African Monetary Zone (WAMZ) predominantly assumes a linear association, neglecting the possibility of...

Concerns about the impact of the general global uncertainty on economic performance have dominated academic debate in the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis leading to huge body of empirical studies on ways of measuring and quantifying countries uncertainty and its impact on GDP,...

Studies have shown that trade relationships among countries in Africa including intra-regional groupings such as the West African Monetary Zone (WAMZ) is low. Therefore, intra-trade becomes critical in unlocking the growth potentials of the continent and its regional groupings. Taking cognizance...

Achieving fiscal convergence between countries of a monetary union helps in the design and implementation of policies to strengthen macroeconomic convergence, which mitigates the contagion effects of macroeconomic instability and ensures the long-term viability of the proposed union. This paper...