IMF delegation here to conduct second review at government’s request |04 May 2022

The IMF delegation called on President Ramkalwan yesterday at State House (Photo: Louis Toussaint)

A delegation from the International Monetary Fund is currently in the country at the request of the government to conduct a second review of the loan programme for Seychelles signed in July last year. 

The review is in relation to the assessment of the country’s economy, policies and recommendations in place.

Led by chief of mission Boriana Yontcheva, the delegation was received by President Wavel Ramkalawan at State House yesterday morning.  The International Monetary Fund (IMF) delegation was accompanied by Minister of Finance, National Planning and Trade, Naadir Hassan and the Governor of the Central Bank of Seychelles (CBS), Caroline Abel.

After their meeting with the head of State, Ms Yontcheva told members of the press that although they are having wonderful exchanges with local stakeholders, they are not in a position to give further details as the assessment is still ongoing.

“This is something that we do in Seychelles every two years as well as in all of our other member states. So right now we are in the middle of the discussion. We’ve had fruitful discussions with the Ministry of Finance, National Planning and Trade with the Central Bank and now we have met with the President and we will continue discussing this week and we’ll have a press briefing at the end on May 9 once the discussions have been concluded,” said Ms Yontcheva. 

She went on to state that there are lots of positive signs and progress made in the country since the signing of the loan programme in July last year, namely in terms of increasing economic activities with the return of visitors.

“That is something that we have already seen at the end of 2021 and I think we can all rejoice that the worse of the pandemic crisis is behind us. In that sense I think we are very happy with the outcome. Lots of other reforms have been successfully carried out. But again we are in the middle of our discussions and our exchanges so I’d rather take stock of everything and tell you more  next week,” Ms Yontcheva concluded. 

Patrick Joubert