IMF Survey: IMF Chief Emphasizes Support for Haiti
IMF Chief Strauss-Kahn (r) with Haitian President Rene Preval at the UN for a donors’ conference on Haiti (photo: IMF).
ASSISTANCE AFTER NATURAL DISASTERS
IMF Chief Emphasizes Support for Haiti
IMF Survey online
Rebuilding the Haitian economy will require immediate financing for Haiti’s budget, said Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the global lender’s managing director, during a donors’ conference at the United Nations.
“Budget support this year is absolutely essential,” Strauss-Kahn said during the meeting in new York on March 31, which included Haitian President Ren Prval, United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and U.N. Special Envoy for Haiti bill Clinton.
Strauss-Kahn encouraged donors to provide Haiti with the $350 million in budget support needed in 2010, according to IMF forecasts. The country faces higher spending needs and a halving of its revenues, and the alternative of high central bank financing could lead to spiraling inflation, which would erode the purchasing power of the poor.
IMF led the way with funds and help
In the days after the devastating earthquake hit the Caribbean nation on January 12, the IMF responded rapidly to Haiti’s needs, and quickly approved $114 million in assistance, the first international organization to provide help in the aftermath of the quake.
The money was used to get cash circulating in the economy so that people could buy food and employees could be paid. The funds are also helping Haiti pay for urgently needed imports.
The IMF’s economic forecast for Haiti is encouraging, according to Strauss-Kahn, with average growth expected to be 8 percent for the next five years. This will help boost the country’s GDP to $1000, compared to $600 prior to the earthquake.
The UN estimates the cost of the total damage and losses in Haiti is roughly $7 billion. A total of $11.5 billion is being sought over the next 10 years for Haitian reconstruction.
Strauss-Kahn said the involvement of the private sector will be important to get the economy working again, and the IMF is working closely with the Haitian government to build a partial credit guarantee fund, which will help the private sector get back to work.
IMF accompanies Haiti on road to recovery
Countries and organizations attending the conference have pledged more than $8 billion so far to help Haiti’s people and economy in the aftermath of the massive earthquake that struck the country two months ago, according to the UN.
Strauss-Kahn also told the UN conference the IMF will present a proposal for the approval of the Executive Board to organize debt relief for Haiti’s total outstanding debt.
Since January, the IMF has continued to work on a number of fronts to help Haiti rebuild its economy.
Earlier in March, an IMF team worked with the Haitian government to revise post-earthquake economic projections, based on the detailed estimates of damages and losses contained in the Post-Disaster needs Assessment coordinated by the UN.
The IMF was also part of the international donors meeting held in Montreal in late January, which started to lay the foundations for Haiti’s recovery. The partners in Haiti’s reconstruction set out some key principles for their work, including Haitian ownership of the process and coordination with international donors.
On March 25 the IMF joined a group of Haitian and international civil society organizations at the United Nations for a meeting to discuss the best ways of delivering Haiti the help it needs. While humanitarian work is ongoing, the group also focused on the long-term vision for Haiti’s reconstruction and economic growth.
Strauss-Kahn said ownership by Haitians in rebuilding their economy is the key to success.
“For all of this to work, the Haitian authorities need to be in the drivers’ seat,” he said. “The IMF experience is that, for such a program to work there needs to be real ownership by the country.”
IMF Survey: IMF Chief Emphasizes Support for Haiti
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Categories: News and Events Tags: caribbean nation, devastating earthquake, donors conference, imf chief, purchasing power
GOING GLOBAL – EAST MEETS WEST – ARTICLES OF INTEREST: March 19-23 …
Annual meeting of the IDB in Cancun March 19-23, 2010
In 2010, the Interamerican Development Bank (IDB) to carry out its annual meeting from March 19 to 23 in Cancun, Mexico.
The event shall be attended by senior authorities of the 48 members’ countries of the IDB, including minister of finances and presidents of central banks, to discuss the future operations of the institution and the development challenges facing by Latin America and the Caribbean. Representatives of other multilateral financial institutions, development organisms and private banks, shall also participate of the meeting. The event shall take place within the framework of the 51st annual meeting of the Governors Assembly of the IDB, the highest authority on political decision of the entity; as it was confirmed by the multilateral agency.
“The World Bank’s board on Thursday approved a $65 million grant to Haiti for restoring key central bank and finance ministry functions, and essential infrastructure”
Friday March 19, 2010
Donors plan to put up $3.8 bln for Haiti rebuilding
SANTO DOMINGO (AFP) – International donors are aiming to provide $3.8 billion over 18months to help Haiti rebuild after its Jan. 12 earthquake, according to officials and experts preparing a high-level donors conference.
(Children wait for the beginning of their class in a make shift school at the slum of Cite-Soleil in Port-au-Prince March 18, 2010).
The preparatory meeting, ahead of a scheduled March 31 donors conference in New York, set out the broad outlines of a reconstruction strategy for the Caribbean nation whose economy and infrastructure were decimated by the quake. The government of Haiti, the poorest state in the Western Hemisphere, says at least 222,570 people and possibly more than 300,000 were killed in what some experts are calling the deadliest natural disaster of modern times. “Donors are committing to provide $3.8 billion to finance the reconstruction and recovery of Haiti’s priority needs, over a period of 18 months, as indicated in the Post-Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA),” said the statement from the joint chairmen of the Santo Domingo experts’ meeting. Dominican Republic President Leonel Fernandez and Haitian Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive chaired the two days of discussions that brought together 40 nations and institutions. The World Bank’s director for the Caribbean, Yvonne Tsikata, described $3.8 billion as an “initial figure” contained in the PDNA document draft. “It’s a short-term target. It’s work in progress,” she said in a conference call with reporters. she said concrete commitments by donors would be made at the one-day “pledging conference” in New York on March 31.
The initial short-term target figure came in a statement released late on Wednesday after a two-day meeting in the Dominican Republic of representatives of Haiti’s government, donor nations, multilateral lenders, U.N. agencies and aid groups.
The World Bank’s board on Thursday approved a $65 million grant to Haiti for restoring key central bank and finance ministry functions, and essential infrastructure.
To manage the long-term reconstruction, the experts in Santo Domingo proposed the creation of a Multi-Donors Trust Fund (MDTF) to be administered by a steering committee jointly formed by the Haitian government and donors. the World Bank would supervise operation of the fund.
In the report that it presented to the Santo Domingo meeting, Haiti’s government assessed the damage caused by the quake at more than $7.7 billion dollars. it estimated a total of $11.5 billion would be needed for reconstruction.
SUPPORT FOR DEBT FORGIVENESS
Speaking in an interview with reporters, Inter-American Development Bank head Luis Moreno said on Thursday there was also wide support among donor countries to cancel about $1.2 billion in debts on Haiti’s books.
“Most of our shareholders have expressed a desire to do a debt relief of the outstanding amount owed by Haiti, of which the IADB has $441 million,” Moreno said. He spoke ahead of the annual meetings of the IADB in Cancun, Mexico, this weekend.
Despite concerns about levels of government corruption in Haiti, which have stymied past aid efforts, the administration of Haitian President Rene Preval has insisted it should have the ultimate say in the reconstruction of the country.
Preval said on Tuesday that the Haitian presidency should have veto power over any reconstruction projects. He has angrily described as “arrogant” U.S. State Department allegations of widespread corruption in his government.
His irritation has threatened to sour ties with Haiti’s main quake relief partner, the United States, which has sent thousands of soldiers, doctors and aid workers to help.
Two former U.S. presidents, bill Clinton, named by the United Nations as coordinator of the international relief effort, and George W. Bush, will visit Haiti on Monday.
The experts’ statement said the donors fund would seek to ease pressure on the overcrowded and wrecked capital Port-au-Prince by supporting development outside of it. it would also seek to strengthen the private sector.
The document added that a commitment to good governance and transparency by the Haitian government was essential.
Occupying the western half of the island of Hispaniola, the former French colony of Haiti won independence in 1804 through a slave revolt and has had a history of uprisings, coups, dictatorships, poverty and social upheaval.
The statement stipulated “a commitment to hold elections in Haiti as soon as possible to avoid a political vacuum.”
Preval has said he would not seek to extend his term beyond its scheduled conclusion on Feb. 11, 2011, and says he is confident that legislative elections — originally scheduled for Feb. 28 — can be reorganized in good time.
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GOING GLOBAL – EAST MEETS WEST – ARTICLES OF INTEREST: March 19-23 …
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Categories: News and Events Tags: annual meeting, central banks, donors conference, ministry functions, s board
