- The International Monetary Fund's outlook for 2022 global growth increases, while its overall growth outlook for 2021 remains unchanged from its previous one.
- In both cases, the outlooks foresee widening gaps in the recovery between advanced economies and emerging market (EM) and developing economies.
- The IMF's global growth forecast for 2021 is 6%, the same as its prior forecast; but the growth prospects for advanced economies improved by 0.5 percentage point, while the prospects for growth in EM and developing economies were revised downward by the same amount.
- For 2022, the IMF projects global growth of 4.9%, up from its previous forecast of 4.4%. That outlook reflects a sizeable upgrade for advanced economies but a more modest one for EM and developing economies.
- To be clear, the pandemic has hurt economic growth around the world, but the degrees of the damage widely vary. The IMF estimates that the pandemic has reduced per capita incomes in advanced economies by 2.8% a year, relative to pre-pandemic trends over 2020-2022 vs. an annual per capita loss of 6.3% for emerging markets and developing economies, excluding China.
- Reasons for the gap include the increased vaccination rates and higher level of fiscal support in advanced economies vs. those of EM and developing economies, the IMF said.
- "Multilateral action is needed to ensure rapid, worldwide access to vaccines, diagnostics, and therapeutics. This would save countless lives, prevent new variants from emerging, and add trillions of dollars to global economic growth," the IMF said.
- In June, the World Bank sees fastest global recovery in 80 years, led by China, U.S.
