Market News

By Mark Itsibor

The World Bank Group has urged Nigeria, Ghana and other African countries to make deliberate efforts at improving the capacity of private sector with a focus on bringing in new investments, out of which can be put in climate-related issues.

World Bank President, David Malpass, made the call yesterday during the press conference for the 2021 World Bank/International Monetary Fund annual conference.

Malpass expressed concern that African countries were lagging way behind the advanced economies. "We have this inequality problem," he said. "Core to making progress on that is improving the private sector capabilities of countries including Ghana, working with governments to identify the strengthening that could be done that brings in new investment. And a chunk of that new investment can come into climate-related issues." The mission is to reduce poverty and increase shared prosperity.

He said there needs to be efficient, clean energy and plants so that there can be more electricity with less carbon dioxide emissions. That's a core goal of the greenhouse gas reduction agenda. And also land use, and ways that there can be protection of biodiversity, which acts as a carbon sink.

Meanwhile, International Monetary and Financial Committee (IMFC) has said strong international cooperation and immediate action are needed to expedite universal vaccination to stem the spread of the pandemic, limit divergence, and support an inclusive recovery everywhere.

In a communique that was issued at the end of its meeting that was chaired by Minister for Finance of Sweden, Ms. Magdalena Andersson, yesterday, IMFC said it would continue to prioritise health spending and protect the most vulnerable, while shifting focus, as appropriate, from crisis response to promoting growth and preserving long-term fiscal sustainability, including where applicable, by bolstering medium-term fiscal frameworks.

"We are also taking comprehensive action to extend financial assistance to countries in need, while supporting countries' efforts to restore debt sustainability and strengthening debt transparency practices by both debtors and creditors, public and private.

"We will work together to accelerate transformational reforms to help build a more resilient and sustainable global economy," it stated.

Earlier, Malpass said inequality was worsening across country groups. Per capita income in advanced economies is growing nearly 5 per cent in 2021, but that is compared to only 0.5 per cent in low-income countries.

According to him, economic outlook remains grim for most of the developing world, saying, "there's high inflation, there are too few jobs, there's shortage that extends to food, water, and electricity."