Nigeria’s economic growth forecast by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) remains unchanged amid the soaring global inflation.
Nigeria’s projection remains 3.4 percent for the year 2022 and is expected to decline to 3.2 percent in 2023 while Sub-Saharan Africa’s projection remains 3.8 percent for the year 2022 and is expected to further increase to 4 percent in 2023.
“The outlooks for countries in the Middle East and Central Asia and sub-Saharan Africa remain on average unchanged or positive, reflecting the effects of elevated fossil fuel and metal prices for some commodity-exporting countries,” the IMF World Economic Outlook report said.
However, the IMF cut its global economic projections for 2022 and 2023 to grow 3.2 percent before slowing to a 2.9 percent GDP rate respectively. This marks a downgrade of 0.4 and 0.7 percentage points, respectively, from April.
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A downgrade from the 3.6 percent and 3.9 percent it had previously projected in April for 2022 and 2023 respectively.
The IMF said the revised outlook indicated that the downside risks outlined in its earlier report were now occurring. Among those challenges are soaring global inflation, a worse-than-expected slowdown in China, and the ongoing fallout from the war in Ukraine.
“The global economy, still reeling from the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, is facing an increasingly gloomy and uncertain outlook,” IMF’s economic counsellor, Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas, said.
“Higher-than-expected inflation, especially in the United States and major European economies, is triggering a tightening of global financial conditions. China’s slowdown has been worse than anticipated amid Covid-19 outbreaks and lockdowns, and there have been further negative spillovers from the war in Ukraine.”
Global inflation is now forecast to hit 6.6 percent in advanced economies and 9.5 percent in emerging market and developing economies this year. This is an upward revision of 0.9 and 0.8 percentage points, respectively.
