IMF Releases World Economic Outlook April 2019 Report

IMF Releases World Economic Outlook April 2019 Report: Details, Key Highlights

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has released the World Economic Outlook 2019 April report. It has made the following forecasts:

The global growth will be 3.3% in 2019, down from 3.6% in 2018 and 4% in 2017.

The reduced growth rates are attributed to lower global expansion in the second half of 2018 caused by U.S.-China trade tensions, macroeconomic stress in Turkey and Argentina, tighter credit policies in China and financial tightening plus normalization of monetary policy in advanced economies.

The emerging markets and developing countries are growing faster than advanced economies.

China is expected to slow down to 5.5% by 2024 as it moves towards increasing private consumption and services and regulatory tightening.

Indian Economy

India’s economy will grow 7.1% in 2019-20 and is expected to accelerate to 7.3% growth this fiscal and to 7.5% in 2021-22. All the estimates are 0.2 percentage points less than its previous assessment in January.

IMF estimates are higher than those of the Reserve Bank of India. RBI had last week cut its growth forecast to 7.2% for this fiscal and 7.4% for FY21.

The reduction in India’s estimate is on account of the “the recent revision to the national account statistics that indicated somewhat softer underlying momentum”.

IMF suggests reforms to hiring and dismissal regulations to help incentivize job creation and absorb the country’s large demographic dividend.
India’s growth is expected to stabilize at 7.75% over the medium term, driven by structural reforms and the easing of infrastructure bottlenecks.

IMF calls for continued implementation of structural and financial sector reforms in order to lower public debt and aid growth.