The International Monetary Fund has warned about the possible pension fund deficit in the future.
The recent decision to increase the retirement age will not solve the problem, IMF experts argue.
Another IMF mission will start working in Belarus on June 21. It will study the economic situation and conduct numerous meetings in the government and National Bank. IMF Mission Chief Peter Dohlman gave a public lecture at the tut.by gallery in Mink on Monday. The Belarusian economy is in the state of recession and ‘adverse external shocks’ are influencing it, he noted. The International Monetary Fund suggests a number of profound reforms “to stabilize the economy and provide the increase of the people’s well-being in medium-term prospect”, Euroradio quotes BelaPAN.
The international experts have noted the positive steps – the reduction of the wages increase rate, lesser pricing scale and the decrease in directive crediting. However, the Belarusian economy needs large-scale reforms, they said.
The pension fund deficit might reach 7% of the GDP by 2015, the IMF thinks. However, the pension age increase may reduce the deficit to 5% of the GDP. The pension fund will stay balanced within the next 5 or 6 years. “The deficit will have to be compensated at the cost of reducing pensions or at the cost of budget subsides,” Peter Dohlman said.
The Belarusian government is hoping to get a $3bn credit from the IMF.
The Belarusian government has invited the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to prepare five large state-owned companies for privatization.
Officially, the unemployment in our country is reducing – if judging by the number of registrations at the labor exchange; however, the number of jobs doesn’t increase in the economy.
Recently Belarus State Military Industrial Committee announced that in the first half of 2016 its enterprises earned a net profit of $80m, thus over-fulfilling the assigned export plans by a quarter.
Poor economic conditions in the countryside, restrictions, unfair competition, inefficiency of state-owned agricultural enterprises also contribute to this ‘success story’, writes Aliaksandr Filipau.
On 20 June Lukashenka met with vice-chair and president of the Chinese CITIC Group Corporation Wang Jiong; it seems especially important in light of Lukashenka’s planned visit to China in September.
All the conditions for everyone to be able to earn a decent salary have been enabled in Belarus, however, it is necessary to make some effort to get the money, assumes the president.
Belarus is losing currency earnings – in the 6 months of 2016 the country earned 3 billion less than in the same period in 2015. Instead of removing the causes of the flop the state relies on magic.
He said Belarus would likely face economic tightening not only as a result of the coronavirus pandemic but also a Russian trade oil crisis that worsened this past winter.
In his report, philosopher Gintautas Mažeikis discusses several concepts that have been a part of the European social and philosophical thought for quite a time.
It is impossible to change life in cities just in three years (the timeline of the “Agenda 50” campaign implementation). But changing the structure of relationships in local communities is possible.