- June 3, 2021
- Posted by: admin
- Category: Current News
The Government of Eswatini conducted a debt sustainability analysis (DSA) with technical assistance from MEFMI from 3 to 14 May 2021. The main objective of the workshop was to assess the sustainability of Eswatini’s public debt in view of the significant macroeconomic challenges induced by the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the workshop aimed to train country officials on the use of the IMF/World Bank Debt Sustainability Framework (DSF) for Market Access Countries (MAC).
The workshop which was conducted with the support of the Financial Sector Deepening Africa – FSD Africa covered the following topics: overview of the debt sustainability framework for MACs and data coverage; indicators of debt sustainability in MACs; drivers of public debt accumulation; and stress testing in the MAC-DSA. The workshop also involved three working groups which generated the relevant data on macroeconomic and market variables, public debt and new financing that is used to populate the MAC DSA template.
A draft report on the findings and recommendations of the debt sustainability analysis was produced and discussed with senior officials from the Eswatini Ministry of Finance. The workshop further enhanced the capacity of 14 Government and Central Bank officials on the use of the framework for MACs to assess debt sustainability. MEFMI expects that going forward, the trained officials will use the knowledge gained from the workshop, to assess Eswatini’s debt sustainability with little or no external support.
The workshop was facilitated by four (4) resource persons: two MEFMI Accredited Fellows (Dr. Nebson Mupunga of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe and Dr. Patrick Ndzinisa of the Central Bank of Eswatini), a Graduate Fellow (Mr. Tawedzerwa Ngundu of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe) and Ms. Cristina Dimande of the MEFMI Secretariat.