448 million dollars

Donors and financing agencies have so far disbursed 448.54 million dollars in response to the Mozambican government’s request for 700 million dollars to meet the needs arising from the Covid-19 pandemic. A document from the Ministry of Economy and Finance, dated 25 August, gives a detailed breakdown of the money received so far, and what it is being used for.

The largest sum received, amounting to 72.23 per cent of the total, is a loan of 324 million dollars from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Of this sum, 309 million dollars is from the IMF Rapid Credit Facility, which has gone into the Mozambican state budget to compensate for the loss of fiscal revenue due to the poor economic performance arising from the impact of the pandemic.

A further 15 million dollars of the IMF funds is debt relief, and has been channelled to the Ministry of Health. Another 15 million from the Fund has been channelled to the National Investment Bank (BNI) as part of a line of credit to provide loans to micro-businesses. The government hopes that eventually this line of credit will reach 160 million dollars, but to date only the IMF has provided any funding. The BNI’s Special Credit Committee has so far approved 45 loan projects for a total of 9.87 million dollars. The African Development Bank (ADB) has provided a grant of 40 million dollars in direct budget support, to be used in line with budgetary requirements.

The World Bank has provided 20 million dollars as “transfers to households”. This is intended to increase the number of households benefitting from the allowances distributed through the National Social Welfare Institute (INAS). The government hopes to increase the number of beneficiary households from 592,179 to 1,695,004, an increase of 186 per cent. For this, the government needs 240 million dollars, but so far only the funds from the World Bank are available.

The government’s appeal included 100 million dollars for the health sector to acquire prevention and protection equipment, and so far the partners have provided 79.5 million dollars. In addition to the IMF’s 15 million dollars, the World Bank has provided 21 million, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria 15.7 million, and the United States government 15.3 million. The rest comes from 13 other donors. There are promises from a variety of other potential donors, listed exhaustively in the Ministry’s document. If all these pledges are honoured, the Mozambican government will receive, not 700 million dollars, but 808.4 million.