CAPACITY DEVELOPMENT Work
The IMF serves as a global hub for knowledge on economic and financial issues. Over the last decades, we have developed world-leading expertise and a repository of experience on which policies work, why they unleash growth, and how best to implement them.
Informed by our experience gained across diverse countries at varying stages of their development, we shares this knowledge with member countries through hands-on advice, training and peer-to-peer learning. This helps governments modernize their institutions to devise economic policies that support growth, stability, and jobs creation.
The capacity development work is part of IMF’s core mandate — along with tracking economic developments and lending to countries that experience crises. This knowledge sharing work focuses on the following areas:
We advise governments on how to raise revenues and effectively manage expenditure, including tax and customs policies, budget formulation, domestic and foreign debt, and social safety nets. This enables governments to provide better public services such as schools, transport, or hospitals.
For instance: In Mongolia, the Ministry of Finance boosted the tax-to-GDP ratio by 5 percent from 2020 to 2024, resulting in a $1 billion increase in revenue. In the Republic of Congo, capacity development is helping phase out costly and regressive fuel subsidies. And Cabo Verde increased tax compliance through digitalization, third-party data collection and cross-matching.
We work with central banks to modernize their financial systems—such as exchange rate, inflation and debt policy—and their banking supervision. This improves the country’s financial stability, fueling domestic growth and international trade.
For instance: Review of Sierra Leone’s financial stability framework provided the central bank with a toolbox to build banking supervision and systemic risk monitoring Nepal has enhanced its data availability and quality for monitoring financial stability. And in Uzbekistan, the central bank pushed an ambitious reform agenda, developing instruments to assess and monitor systemic risks as well as increasing the effectiveness of the central bank’s financial stability decisions.
We help countries align their legal and governance frameworks to international standards so they can develop sound financial reforms, fight corruption and combat money laundering and terrorism financing.
For instance: The IMF supported Jamaica in its efforts to overhaul governance, leading to the country’s removal from the Financial Action Task Force’s grey list. In Namibia, the IMF’s assistance led to significant legal and institutional reforms. And Benin, Chad, Comoros, Costa Rica, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Haiti, Mali, Mauritania, and Uganda were supported in enhancing transparency and accountability, preventing conflicts of interest and corruption.
We help countries with compilation, management and reporting of their macroeconomic and financial statistics data. This provides more accurate understanding of their economies—including of economic vulnerabilities and risks—and helps formulate more informed policies. It also fosters transparency and trust in government policies, thereby attracting international investors, who use such statistics to gauge macroeconomic stability.
For instance: Uzbekistan was supported in upgrading its External Sector Statistics, which improved transparency and contributed to the government’s ability to issue Eurobonds for the first time. Burkina Faso has enhanced its debt management frameworks, including in the early detection of potential vulnerabilities. And Papua New Guinea received substantial support, which enabled more informed oversight and integration of state-owned enterprises into broader public sector analysis.
We work closely with government officials to strengthen their ability to forecast, analyze, design, and implement sound economic policies. This helps deepen the dialogue with countries on policy issues and facilitates sharing of policy experiences through peer-to-peer learning.
For instance: the Financial Programming and Policies course covers the features of the main sectors of the economy and the linkages between them and shows how to diagnose macroeconomic imbalances and design adjustment policies.
On authorities’ request, we also offer technical assistance with the following macroeconomic frameworks and tools to support more in-depth and targeted capacity development:
Brochure: “Forecasts in Action: Building Capacity in Macroeconomic Policy Analysis”
