IMF revises 2010 growth forecasts downwards. - The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has once again revised its growth forecasts downwards. In its April 2009 World Economic Outlook, the IMF did not foresee any rapid recovery in the world economy. It expects world gross domestic product (GDP) to shrink by 1.3% over the whole of the year, followed by only partial recovery in 2010, with growth of 1.9%. For this turnaround to be achieved, even greater efforts have to be made to restructure the financial sector, it recommends. The report says that advanced economies experienced an unprecedented 7.5% decline in real GDP in the fourth quarter of 2008, and the IMF says that output is estimated to have fallen almost as fast in the first quarter of 2009. The US economy has suffered most from intensified financial strains and the continued fall in the housing sector. Western Europe and the advanced economies of Asia have been hit hard by the collapse in global trade and by rising financial problems of their own and housing corrections in some national markets. Emerging economies are also suffering badly, and generally recorded a 4% contraction in economic activity in the fourth quarter. Forecasts for the euro area are even more pessimistic, with the European area being the only region when real PIB is expected to fall year on year in 2009 and 2010. It is expected to experience an unprecedented fall in GDP of 4.2% this year and to be in recession again next year. The downturn in world trade and its continuing fragility are also of concern to the IMF which, after forecasting only a 2.8% decline in January, expects trade to fall off a cliff, dropping 11%. For 2010, only a slight increase of 0.6% is expected. (I.L.)