The Honourable Colm Imbert, Minister of Finance, welcomes the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) Annual Report on Trinidad and Tobago, published on June 05 2024, which provides an independent assessment of our economy. The IMF underlines that “Trinidad and Tobago is undergoing a gradual and sustained economic recovery.”

The unemployment rate decreased to 3.2 percent in 2023 after peaking at 7.2 percent in 2020. Economic growth is broad based, led by the non-energy and energy sectors, while inflation is low.

The IMF hails the sharp decline in inflation, from 8.7 percent in December 2022 to 0.3 percent in January 2024, which is among the lowest in the world and contributes to shielding the purchasing power of the population.

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Port of Spain: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has concluded the 2023 Article IV consultation with Trinidad and Tobago, praising the country’s progress in recovering from the COVID-pandemic and achieving fiscal discipline. The Executive Board of the IMF endorsed the staff appraisal following consultations in Port of Spain held with the Ministry of Finance, the Central Bank of Trinidad and Tobago, the Tobago House of Assembly, as well as several other government agencies, financial institutions and private organizations.

The IMF – that praised the “decisive policy response of the Authorities” during the pandemic– highlights that “Trinidad and Tobago’s economic activity is recovering supported by higher global energy prices and the rebound of the non-energy sector”. The report also noted that public debt has declined and the external position has improved.

Today, the IMF has released the Concluding Statement of its two-week 2023 Article IV Mission to Trinidad and Tobago. It is a yearly health-check by international experts, of Trinidad and Tobago’s economy and finances.

The Minister of Finance, the Honourable Colm Imbert, MP, extends his thanks to the IMF team, “for the thorough work and high quality exchanges that have taken place during the two-week Mission”.

The concluding statement points to the ongoing broad-based recovery of the economy, with a projected growth for 2023 at 3.2% (following 2.5% in 2022), even higher than the Government’s own projections for growth. “Such positive outlook”, adds the Minister, “is notable given the complicated international economic context”.

“We value the endorsement by the international community of the policies we have put in place to protect our population and certainly agree that the immediate priority is to foster the recovery” adds Minister Imbert.