IMF Executive Board Completes Final Review Under the Extended Fund Facility Arrangement with Suriname

IMF News, March 24, 2025

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Canonical URL: IMF Executive Board Completes Final Review Under the Extended Fund Facility Arrangement with Suriname

The Executive Board approved the ninth and final review under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) arrangement with Suriname.
The completion allows the authorities to draw the equivalent of SDR 46.8 million (about USD 62 million).
Total program disbursement now totals SDR 430.7 million (about USD 572 million).
In completing the review, the Executive Board approved the authorities’ request for a waiver of non-observance of the end-December 2024 performance criteria on the central government primary balance based on the corrective actions the authorities have already taken.
Suriname’s EFF arrangement was approved on December 22, 2021, in an amount equivalent to SDR 472.8 million (366.8 percent of quota).

Program objective: restore macroeconomic stability and debt sustainability, while laying the foundations for strong and more inclusive growth.
Program focus areas: restoring fiscal and debt sustainability; protecting the poor and vulnerable; upgrading the monetary and exchange rate policy framework; addressing banking sector vulnerabilities; and advancing the anti-corruption and governance reform agenda.
Reported outcomes:
- The economy is growing.
- Inflation is receding / approaching single digits.
- Public debt is declining.
- Autonomy and governance of the central bank have been strengthened.
- Investor confidence is returning (international bond spreads are at record low levels).
- Donor support is increasing.

Maintain fiscal discipline in the run-up to the elections while protecting the vulnerable.
Main actions recommended:
- Strengthen the fiscal framework, including operationalization of the recently enacted fiscal rules supported by appropriate institutional mechanisms.
- Maintain the path for debt reduction while protecting the vulnerable from the burden of adjustment.
- Gradually phase out electricity subsidies to create fiscal space.
- Strengthen tax administration to create fiscal space for higher, targeted social assistance and infrastructure spending.
- Fully implement the recently finalized social assistance reform plan to improve efficiency and effectiveness of social programs.
- Strengthen financial management controls in the state-owned electricity company, including regularly publishing its audited financial statements.

Debt restructuring progress:
- Bilateral agreements with all official creditors have been achieved.
- Agreements have been reached with all but one commercial creditor.
- Domestic debt arrears have been cleared.
Fiscal management recommendations:
- Improve commitment controls in the budget.
- Address weaknesses in cash management to restrain public spending and prevent accumulation of supplier arrears.

A restrictive monetary policy is supporting disinflation.
Recent implementation of the agreed central bank recapitalization plan is a critical step to ensure a strong central bank balance sheet with clear operational and financial autonomy.
Authorities’ commitment to a flexible, market-determined exchange rate is supporting international reserve accumulation.
Financial sector recommendations:
- Timely implementation of recapitalization plans for undercapitalized commercial banks.
- Improve monitoring of non-bank financial institutions to bolster financial sector resilience.
- Continue strengthening oversight and governance to address banking sector vulnerabilities.

Authorities should persevere with an ambitious structural reform agenda to:
- Strengthen institutions.
- Address governance weaknesses.
- Build climate resilience.
- Improve data quality.
- Address gender gaps.
The Fund and other development partners will continue to support this work with capacity development.

Speaker: Mr. Kenji Okamura, Deputy Managing Director and Acting Chair.
Key points from the statement:
- The authorities’ reforms under the EFF-supported program—the first ever to be completed by Suriname—are increasingly bolstering macroeconomic stability and investor confidence.
- In view of the Final Investment Decision for the country’s oil resources, it is critical to put in place robust institutional frameworks, including fiscal rules and improved transparency and accountability safeguards.
- Such institutional improvements will help Suriname avoid procyclical fiscal policy, prioritize urgent development needs, ensure intergenerational equity, and transform exhaustible resource wealth into financial assets.
- Emphasis on fiscal discipline, social protection, fiscal space creation, financial management transparency, central bank recapitalization, flexible exchange rate policy, and continued structural reforms.

IMF Press Release No. 25/74, March 24, 2025