CAIRO: The International Monetary Fund and the Egyptian authorities have agreed to finalize work to reach a staff-level agreement ‘very soon’, the multilateral lender said on Saturday.
“IMF staff and the Egyptian authorities have held very productive in-person discussions on the margins of the IMF and World Bank Annual Meetings and made substantial progress on all policies”, the statement from IMF spokesman Gerry Rice said.
They include monetary and exchange rate policies to anchor inflation expectations, improve monetary policy transmission and the functioning of the foreign exchange market and bolster Egypt’s external resilience.
The policies would enable the country to gradually and sustainably rebuild foreign reserves, the statement said.
The IMF said discussions covered “a continued fiscal consolidation path that will safeguard public debt sustainability and ensure a steady decline of the debt-to-GDP ratio over the medium term”.
Fiscal and related structural policies to further expand the social safety net for the most vulnerable, improve the budget composition, and enhance fiscal transparency were also discussed, the statement added.
IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva said she would meet on Saturday with delegations from Egypt and Tunisia and was confident the global lender would be “backing them up.”