On Saturday 18 July, the G20 Finance Ministers postponed until October a decision to extend to 2021 the DSSI, under which debt servicing in 2020 has been suspended for the poorest countries because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
In the communiqué, the G20 ‘Finance’ group stated: “We will consider a possible extension of the DSSI in the second half of 2020, taking into account the development of the Covid-19 pandemic situation and the findings of a report from the IMF and the World Bank on the liquidity needs of eligible countries, which will be submitted to the G20 in advance of our meeting in October 2020”.
France is in favour of extending the initiative to 2021 (see EUROPE 12530/13).
Ministers welcomed the progress made under the DSSI. As of 18 July, 42 countries had requested to benefit from the DSSI, leading to suspension of nearly “US$5.3 billion” of repayments.
The IMF and the World Bank have proposed a fiscal monitoring framework to facilitate implementation of the initiative. All official bilateral creditors should implement the initiative “fully and in a transparent manner”, said the ministers.
The final ‘G20 Finance’ communiqué can be found at: https://bit.ly/3fXpJoN (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)