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Paola Giuliano
and
Antonio Spilimbergo
A growing body of work has shown that aggregate shocks affect the formation of preferences and beliefs. This article reviews evidence from sociology, social psychology, and economics to assess the relevance of aggregate shocks, whether the period in which they are experienced matters, and whether they alter preferences and beliefs permanently. We review the literature on recessions, inflation experiences, trade shocks, and aggregate non-economic shocks including migrations, wars, terrorist attacks, pandemics, and natural disasters. For each aggregate shock, we discuss the main empirical methodologies, their limitations, and their comparability across studies, outlining possible mechanisms whenever available. A few conclusions emerge consistently across the reviewed papers. First, aggregate shocks impact many preferences and beliefs, including political preferences, risk attitudes, and trust in institutions. Second, the effect of shocks experienced during young adulthood is stronger and longer lasting. Third, negative aggregate economic shocks generally move preferences and beliefs to the right of the political spectrum, while the effects of non-economic adverse shocks are more heterogeneous and depend on the context.
International Monetary Fund
and
World Bank
The outlook for Low-Income Countries (LICs) is gradually improving, but they face persistent macroeconomic vulnerabilities, including liquidity challenges due to high debt service. There is significant heterogeneity among LICs: the poorest and most fragile countries have faced deep scarring from the pandemic, while those with diversified economies and Frontier Markets are faring better. Achieving inclusive growth and building resilience are essential for LICs to converge with more advanced economies and meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Building resilience will also be critical in the context of a more shock-prone world. This requires both decisive domestic actions, including expanding and better targeting Social Safety Nets (SSNs), and substantial external support, including adequate financing, policy advice, capacity development and, where needed, debt relief. The Fund is further stepping up its support through targeted policy advice, capacity building, and financing.
International Monetary Fund. Monetary and Capital Markets Department
This paper reports to the Executive Board on the outcomes of the Central Bank Transparency Code (CBT) pilot reviews. The pilot CBT reviews helped central banks evaluate their transparency practices and strengthen dialogue with external stakeholders. The CBT pilots provided valuable information on the resources required for the reviews going forward. Staff will continue to offer CBT reviews to the rest of the membership. The staff will report back to the Board in FY2026 on the progress of the CBT reviews and an update to the Code following five years of implementation.
International Monetary Fund. Monetary and Capital Markets Department
This paper on Uganda discusses Central Bank Transparency Code Review. The Bank of Uganda (BOU) is implementing transparency practices that are broadly aligned with the good practices for central banks. The BOU continues to improve communication of its monetary policy framework in a transparent manner, but there is room to enhance transparency by disclosing policy deliberations. The BOU has improved macroprudential policies and the analytical framework aimed at mitigating systemic risks, but decisions leading to macroprudential actions are not explained. The anti-corruption legal framework in Uganda applies to the BOU, however no details are disclosed in the public domain as to how it is applied and enforced with respect to the BOU. The BOU should consider compiling and developing a policy on confidentiality that includes the reasons underlying the choices it has made on disclosure or nondisclosure. The mission found that BOU’s transparency practices largely conform to various dimensions of transparency as information is disseminated through several channels.
International Monetary Fund. Fiscal Affairs Dept.
Uganda has achieved significant improvements in public investment management over the last few years. The new IMF Public Investment Management Assessment (PIMA) report shows that Uganda is well ahead of its comparators in many aspects of public investment management, in particular in institutional design. A number of important measures have been undertaken, including giving the Development Committee a strong role as a gatekeeper for new investment proposals, the establishment of the Projects Analysis and Public Investment Department, and development of guidelines and manuals to improve the quality of project preparation and appraisal. Many reforms are fairly recent and are not fully institutionalized, so there is a clear need to continue and to further strengthen public investment management in Uganda. The IMF and other development partners are active partners to the government in pursuing these reforms.
Brandon Buell
,
Reda Cherif
,
Carissa Chen
,
Jiawen Tang
, and
Nils Wendt
The COVID-19 pandemic underscores the critical need for detailed, timely information on its evolving economic impacts, particularly for Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) where data availability and lack of generalizable nowcasting methodologies limit efforts for coordinated policy responses. This paper presents a suite of high frequency and granular country-level indicator tools that can be used to nowcast GDP and track changes in economic activity for countries in SSA. We make two main contributions: (1) demonstration of the predictive power of alternative data variables such as Google search trends and mobile payments, and (2) implementation of two types of modelling methodologies, machine learning and parametric factor models, that have flexibility to incorporate mixed-frequency data variables. We present nowcast results for 2019Q4 and 2020Q1 GDP for Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Uganda, and Ghana, and argue that our factor model methodology can be generalized to nowcast and forecast GDP for other SSA countries with limited data availability and shorter timeframes.
Hites Ahir
,
Hendre Garbers
,
Mattia Coppo
,
Mr. Giovanni Melina
,
Mr. Futoshi Narita
,
Ms. Filiz D Unsal
,
Vivian Malta
,
Xin Tang
,
Daniel Gurara
,
Luis-Felipe Zanna
,
Linda G. Venable
,
Mr. Kangni R Kpodar
, and
Mr. Chris Papageorgiou
Despite strong economic growth since 2000, many low-income countries (LICs) still face numerous macroeconomic challenges, even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the deceleration in real GDP growth during the 2008 global financial crisis, LICs on average saw 4.5 percent of real GDP growth during 2000 to 2014, making progress in economic convergence toward higher-income countries. However, the commodity price collapse in 2014–15 hit many commodity-exporting LICs and highlighted their vulnerabilities due to the limited extent of economic diversification. Furthermore, LICs are currently facing a crisis like no other—COVID-19, which requires careful policymaking to save lives and livelihoods in LICs, informed by policy debate and thoughtful research tailored to the COVID-19 situation. There are also other challenges beyond COVID-19, such as climate change, high levels of public debt burdens, and persistent structural issues.
Mr. Younes Zouhar
,
Jon Jellema
,
Nora Lustig
, and
Mohamed Trabelsi
This paper explores the role of public expenditure in fostering inclusive growth. It starts with a presentation of salient features of public expenditure. Then, it lays out an analytical framework that describes the channels through which public expenditure affects inequality and poverty in the short and long term. Based on a review of the empirical literature, it discusses the policy options. Finally, the paper assesses the role of key factors such as the initial conditions, and the institutions, in shaping the inclusive spending policies.
Mr. Ian Lienert
This paper examines the institutional arrangements of the macro-fiscal function in 16 African countries. Most ministries of finance (MoFs) have established a macro-fiscal department or unit, but their functions, size, structure and outputs vary considerably. Based on a survey, we present data on staff size, functional scope and the forecasting performance of macro-fiscal departments and identify common challenges in the countries reviewed. Some MoFs perform many macro-fiscal functions, but actions of various kinds are needed to strengthen their macro-fiscal departments. This paper provides some guidance for policy-makers in the region for enhancing the quality and scope of macro-fiscal outputs.
International Monetary Fund. African Dept.

Abstract

Sub-Saharan Africa is struggling to navigate an unprecedented health and economic crisis—one that, in just a few months, has jeopardized decades of hard-won development gains and upended the lives and livelihoods of millions.