The Annual Meetings of the World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund (IMF) Annual earlier scheduled to take place in Marrakesh, Morocco, in October 2022 will now take place in Washington D.C. due to continuing uncertainty over the COVID-19 pandemic.
But the October 2023 Annual Meetings will be held in Marrakesh.
The World Bank Group and IMF announced this in a joint statement on Monday, saying the decision was taken in consultation with the Kingdom of Morocco. This is the second straight annual change on the back of persisting uncertainties around the pandemic.
Read also: World Bank sees oil price rally eluding Nigeria on N3trn subsidy
The Annual Meetings are usually held for two consecutive years at the World Bank Group and IMF headquarters in Washington, D.C. and every third year in another member country.
The last meeting outside Washington DC was held in Bali Nusa Dua, Indonesia, in October 2018.
The Annual Meetings bring together central bankers, ministers of finance and development, private sector executives, civil society, media and academics to discuss issues of global concern, including the world economic outlook, global financial stability, poverty eradication, inclusive economic growth and job creation, climate change, and others.
The meetings were held virtually in 2020, but were held in a hybrid format in October 2021, with the IMF and World Bank headquarters highly restricted and the usual in-person public debates and discussions on global economic issues lacking.
