Africa needs more than G20 offers to address looming debt crisis
African countries face another debt crisis and will need more long-term help than the latest G20 debt plan offers them to ward off trouble and keep much-needed investments coming in, according to policymakers, analysts and investors.
Approximately 40 percent of sub-Saharan African countries were in or at risk of debt distress even before this year, while Zambia became the continent’s first pandemic-era default last Friday
The United States, China and other G20 countries have offered the world’s poorest countries – many of which are in Africa – relief until at least mid-2021 and sketched out rules for rescheduling government debt to help fend off the risk of default in the wake of the coronavirus crisis.
But these plans to provide near-term breathing space might not go far enough.
“In 2021, a robust liquidity and structural response, recovery and reset toolbox must be developed in partnership between emerging markets, the private sector and the G20,” warned Vera Songwe, executive secretary at the UN Economic Commission for Africa.
Songwe is pushing for measures to unlock $500bn to help avoid leaving lasting scars due to prolonged funding gaps in the poorest economies.
The debt ratios of sub-Saharan African countries had already risen sharply before COVID-19, just more than a decade after the International Monetary Fund and World Bank launched the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative that slashed the debt burdens of some 30 low-income countries on the continent.
Fast forward to the year of the pandemic and sub-Saharan Africa is on track for a record 3 percent economic contraction this year, while debt-to-GDP ratios have doubled during the last decade to 57 percent, the IMF found.
“We are definitely already in a debt crisis, there is no question about that,” said Bryan Carter, head of global emerging markets debt at HSBC, referring to poor countries around the globe.
“I worry about 2021. I worry about a deal in which many countries who will once again have to finance themselves in a slow or even recessionary economic environment where a vaccine is not yet globally available. For many countries, that is one year too many to finance themselves.”
Cancellations, suspensions, lower borrowing costs
Some countries will need help with their debt stock, not just with payments.
Politicians such as Ethiopia’s prime minister and Ghana’s finance minister, as well as campaign groups have pushed for outright debt cancellations, on top of widespread calls for a longer suspension of servicing and repayment for the continent’s poorest countries.
Others, such as UNECA and some private investors, have also suggested the strength of development banks could be leveraged through loans and guarantees to bring down borrowing costs for countries under the most pressure.
“There are definitely some countries, like Zambia and Angola or Ghana, that are in pretty fragile spots right now,” said S&P Global Ratings sovereign group managing director Roberto Sifon-Arevalo, adding that the proposed plans did not tackle structural problems. “You need something much more profound and deeper and holistic than this particular approach.”
African countries make up half of the 73 countries eligible for the G20 Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI).
Much has changed since the HIPC initiative when money was mainly owed to wealthy countries and multilateral institutions. Now, a plethora of creditors make help more complicated.
China plays a key role: its government, banks and companies lent some $143bn to Africa from 2000 to 2017, according to Johns Hopkins University.
