An International Monetary Fund (IMF) team, led by Mr. Axel Schimmelpfennig,
visited Kampala from September 30 to October 4, 2019 to discuss Uganda’s
economic outlook and the direction of macroeconomic policies.
At the conclusion of the mission, Mr. Schimmelpfennig issued the following
statement:
“Growth could remain at around 6 percent in 2019/20, if oil investments are
not significantly delayed. The current account deficit widened to 11
percent of GDP in 2018/19 largely due to investment-related imports. The
Ugandan shilling has remained broadly stable.
“After last year’s strong performance in domestic revenue collection,
execution of the current budget (fiscal year 2019/20) is challenging.
Delays in the implementation of some revenue measures and shortfalls in
non-tax revenues are likely to widen the overall fiscal deficit. The
authorities need to adopt measures of around 1 percent of GDP to safeguard
their budget targets and prevent a recurrence of domestic arrears.
“The government’s medium-term fiscal policy framework rests on the
assumptions that oil sector investments proceed as planned, implementation
of the domestic revenue mobilization strategy yields ½ percent of GDP in
additional revenue collection per year, and the government achieves
improvements in public investment management, in particular in project
selection, planning, and execution, to ensure that infrastructure
investment yields the envisaged growth dividend.
“Bank of Uganda’s October 7 decision to lower its policy rate by 100 basis
points to 9 percent was appropriate, with core inflation at 2.5 percent
year-on-year in September and projected to stay below 5 percent over the
next 12–18 months. The financial sector remains healthy based on the latest
reported financial soundness indicators. The regulatory framework and Bank
of Uganda’s strong supervision have been instrumental in this regard.
“On the sidelines of the visit, the African Development Bank, the
Government of Uganda, and the IMF co-organized a workshop to discuss
balancing infrastructure and human capital investments. Participants agreed
that achieving sustained high and inclusive growth will require a mix of
physical and human capital investment that complement each other. In
addition, allocating more resources to maintenance is essential to
maximizing the return on infrastructure investment.
“The mission team thanks the authorities for the productive discussions.”
The IMF mission met with Governor Tumusiime-Mutebile, Permanent Secretary/Secretary to the Treasury Muhakanizi, senior government
officials, and private sector representatives.
