2026 Comprehensive Surveillance Review: Public Consultation with Civil Society Organizations (CSOs)

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The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is conducting the 2026 Comprehensive Surveillance Review (CSR) to strengthen the IMF’s ability to support member countries and global economic stability.
The 2026 CSR will assess surveillance performance since the 2021 CSR, identify key gaps and challenges, set forward-looking priorities for the next 5-10 years, and develop a prioritization framework for engagement in new policy areas.
The 2026 CSR report presenting staff’s findings and recommendations will be submitted to the IMF’s Executive Board for consideration and approval next year.
Views from Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and other non-media and non-governmental stakeholders will inform the 2026 CSR report.

Surveillance is defined as monitoring of and provision of advice on the economic and financial policies of member countries, alongside oversight of the International Monetary System (IMS).
The legal basis for IMF surveillance is Article IV (A-IV) of the Articles of Agreement and the 2012 Integrated Surveillance Decision (2012 ISD).
The 2026 CSR will:
- Assess surveillance performance since the 2021 CSR.
- Identify key gaps and challenges.
- Set priorities to guide surveillance over the next 5-10 years.
- Develop a prioritization framework for the Fund’s engagement in new policy areas.
- Include proposals to sharpen the focus of Article IV staff reports, including by streamlining some of the requirements.
The CSR will specifically focus on new areas for which Executive Board–approved strategies emerged after the 2021 CSR, namely climate change, digital money, and gender.
The prioritization framework, in principle, can be applied to all policy areas other than those always subject to the Fund’s bilateral surveillance per the 2012 ISD (for example, exchange rate, monetary, fiscal, and financial sector policies and their macroeconomically relevant structural aspects).

Past surveillance reviews emphasized improving the Fund’s capacity to deliver robust analysis and advice on:
- Vulnerabilities and risks to domestic and external stability.
- Cross-border spillovers.
- Macro-financial surveillance.
Successive reviews broadened IMF surveillance scope to other policy areas relevant to domestic and external stability guided by the macrocriticality criterion.
A policy is considered macrocritical if it significantly influences present or prospective balance of payments or domestic stability (see 2022 Surveillance Guidance Note, Box 2).

The IMF is conducting a three-phase consultation with non-media and non-governmental stakeholders during June 2025 and mid 2026.
Phase 1 — Awareness Raising Meeting:
- Virtual sessions to introduce the review and consultation process held on June 26 and July 9, 2025.
Phase 2 — Online survey:
- Open from July 25 – September 15, 2025.
- Structured survey available in English, Arabic, French, Spanish, and Russian.
- All responses must be submitted electronically through the online form by September 15.
- The survey will take approximately 20 minutes to fill in.
- Participants who submit the survey will be invited to Phase 3.
Phase 3 — Follow-up discussion(s):
- Virtual/hybrid meeting(s) with those who participated in Phase 2 to share findings, dig deeper into feedback, and provide updates on the review process.

Stakeholders covered by the 2015 Guidelines on the IMF Staff Engagement with Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) are invited to participate.
Eligible participants include:
- Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and CSOs
- Business forums
- Faith based organizations
- Youth organizations
- Labor unions and professional organizations
- Local community groups
- Philanthropic and charitable organizations
- Gender and women’s associations
- Local organizations of persons with disabilities
- Social movements (including representatives of the informal sector and rural areas)
- Academics
- Research centers
- Think tanks
To access the Arabic translation of the survey, participants should send an email to publicaffairs@imf.org with the subject line: “Public Consultation CSR – Arabic translation of the survey”; the team will then send it directly.

Phase 2 is open from July 25 – September 15, 2025; all Phase 2 respondents will be invited to Phase 3.
The 2026 CSR report with staff findings and recommendations will be submitted to the IMF’s Executive Board for consideration and approval next year.
The consultation process will continue through mid 2026 as part of the three-phase plan.