IMF team to visit Sri Lanka for second EFF review

A team from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is to arrive in Sri Lanka for the second review of the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) programme which is to begin on 07 March, according to State Minister of Finance Shehan Semasinghe.

The state minister said he believes the second review for the third disbursement under the extended fund facility will be carried out across a period of around two weeks. 

“The second review will commence from the 7th of March and we are very confident that will be a smoother review than the first review.”

“Because the first review, it was the initial stages of the implementation of the policy decisions the government had taken,” he told reporters, during a press briefing at the Presidential Media Center on Wednesday (28).

The progress in meeting key commitments under the IMF-supported program is set to be formally assessed in the context of the second review of the EFF arrangement alongside the forthcoming 2024 Article IV consultation assessing Sri Lanka’s economic health.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) had previously said the second review of Sri Lanka’s $2.9 billion bailout could be completed in the first half of 2024, provided it manages to meet debt restructuring and revenue targets set under the programme.

The IMF executive board had cleared the first review of Sri Lanka’s $2.9 billion bailout in December last year, providing about $337 million in funds to help tackle the fallout from the country’s worst financial crisis in decades.