Conditionalities

Here are the three critical RCEP conditionalities recommended by the agriculture sector, and specified in the RCEP ratification, that have not been addressed.

Today, we urgently need an international financial architecture that will help developing countries receive concessional, low-cost, low-interest-rate funds, with minimum conditionalities.

I concur well with Ekpe that the “bitter or sugar-coated pills” are only recommended by the WB/IMF when the countries choose to sleep on their laps, often with stiff conditionalities.

The British government has commended Ghana for how well it has handled the Internal Monetary Fund (IMF) conditionalities.

Late last year, the European Network on Debt and Development (Eurodad) released an important on IMF loan conditionalities and the impact this has had on health care.

Many have argued for the rand, albeit with the attendant Rand Monetary Union conditionalities.

One of the conditionalities the global institutions invariably impose while giving a large loan is sharp devaluation.

The EU should go beyond that, however: it must use its trade policy to impose strong, enforceable social and environmental conditionalities.

These include global financial arrangements which make producer countries ‘price takers’; conditions that promote illicit financial flows; conditionalities associated with capital acquisition and its high cost.