Macron hosts summit on Africa finance

Macron hosts summit on Africa finance

PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted African leaders and global financial institutions for a summit seeking to provide Africa with critical financing after the COVID-19 pandemic depleted the continent’s coffers. Africa has so far been less badly hit by the pandemic than other global regions-with a total of 130,000 dead across the continent, compared with 3.4 million worldwide.

But the economic cost is only too apparent, with the International Monetary Fund warning in late 2020 that Africa faces a shortfall in the funds needed for future development-a financial gap of $290 billion up to 2023. While richer countries are running major economic recovery programs, Africa “does not have the financial means today to relaunch its economy,” Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire told RFI radio.

He warned against the risk of a “great economic divergence between Africa, which would go backwards, while the United States, Europe and Asia recover strongly”. A moratorium on the service of public debt agreed in April last year by the G20 and the Paris Club, a group of creditor countries that tries to find sustainable solutions for debtor nations, was welcomed but will not be enough.

Many want a moratorium on the service of all external debt until