Read for you: Rwanda in 2013 – Tough News From IMF/World Bank | David Himbara

Dear Rwandan compatriots, hot off the press is the Joint Staff Advisory Note (JSAN) on Rwanda by the IMF and the International Development Association (World Bank Group).For a country without robust academia, media, opposition parties, think tanks, active civil society, JSAN is pretty well the only source of hard analysis of what has been termed “North Korea of the thousand hills.” 

It is my pleasure to provide some highlights in the JSAN which was issued this month, namely December 2013. I quote extensively what the report says on (a) debt, (b) domestic resources mobilisation, (c) infrastructure development, (d) agricultural transformation, (e) micro-enterprise sector and (f) accountable governance.

 

Here we go:

 

ON DEBT

 

The Joint Staff express concern on Rwanda’s borrowing “because of the country’s narrow export base.” In other words, the IMF and World Bank are wondering how Rwanda will pay back the loans if it does not earn by robust exporting. In their view, a larger debt service burden is high risk for a country whose debt was previously written off.

 

ON DOMESTIC RESOURCES MOBILISATION

 

The Joint Staff state simply that the government in its current Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy “is largely silent about this will achieved.”

 

ON INFRASTRUCTURE FOR FACILITATING PRIVATE SECTOR DEVELOPMENT

 

This is probably the most damning part of the JSAN which concludes as follows: “Over the past five years improvements in the investment climate have not been associated with a significant increase in private investment, which means the cost of doing business is still high.”

 

ON AGRICULTURAL TRANSFORMATION

 

Specialised agricultural skills “are needed to make land more productive, especially given the small average size of landholdings, and create linkages to markets…” JSAN encourages the government “to elaborate a detailed strategy for the development of agricultural skills.”

 

ON SMALL BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT

 

Promotion of small business and micro-enterprise sector “remains vague on the actual strategy to do so.” JSAN “encourages the government to design a solid strategy for the development of micro-enterprise sector.”

 

ON ACCOUNTABLE GOVERNANCE

 

According to JSAN, a discussion of the changing requirements of the public service “is absent.” This needs to change. “The government will need to articulate clearly where priority focus will be in the medium term as regards to strengthening the capacity of different levels of government ”

 

There you have it folks.

 

I encourage everyone to visit the IMF website and dig into the documents directly.

Rwanda and the IMF-Updated December 20, 2013