IMF official lists ways to successful reforms
By Bukky Olajide and Sunday Obidigbo
FOR on-going reforms in the country to yield fruits, proper implementation and sustainability should be combined with controlled government spending.
The first deputy managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and former vice president of the World Bank, Anna Kruegar said at a press briefing in Lagos at the weekend that reduced government spending will reduce inflation and ultimately result in reduced poverty among the citizenry.
While commending the on-going reforms, she insisted that sustainability and proper implementation are really the soul of reforms.
Kruegar, who claimed to have met President Olusegun Obasanjo over the reform package and allied economic matters a few days earlier, said the President had expressed worry over the state of infrastructure in the country and had begun to map out ways of improving them.
The IMF Vice President also stressed the need for a country to open up its doors to international trade. "Trade is the engine of growth, sustained reforms can only be achieved if a country opens its doors to the rest of the world," she said.
While saying that any country that refuses to open its doors to the rest of the world will stagnate, Kruegar emphasised however, that trade liberalisation can only flourish where country's economic reforms have brought about discipline and growth.
The IMF, said Kruegar, is doing all it could to support developing countries, including Nigeria in trade liberalisation.
Kruegar said that as the reforms are implemented, the positive results will also rub off on the financial sector and as the economy grows, credit allocation will become better.
Nigeria, she said, is blessed with enormous natural resources but it is faced with numerous challenges.
"However, if a reform project like the National Economic Empowerment Strategy (NEEDS) can be implemented fully, then the economy would gain much from the natural resources."
The Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Professor Charles Soludo, in response, explained that NEEDS is a home-grown strategy for poverty alleviation with four key pillars that include financial sector reforms, and developing the private sector.
Part of the NEEDS document, includes addressing the issue of inequality and valve of social orientation, according to him.
Soludo added that the budgets of state and local governments combined are more than that of the Federal Government, which is also meant to combat poverty at the lower level of the citizenry.
The director of the Lagos Business School, Professor Pat Utomi urged policy makers to ensure effective implementation of the various reforms and check unhealthy rivalry.
Utomi observed that if the reforms are implemented well, Nigeria may even be considered for debt reduction and this will also rub off well on other sectors of the economy," he said.
Utomi also observed that efforts to reform the nation's financial sector are also beginning to yield fruits.
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