Estimates of experts and international economic institutions indicated that there are no good signs in the new year for those dreaming of a global economic improvement, and expect that this year will be more difficult than the previous one, whether for business owners or ordinary people who only aspire to meet their basic needs.

And the program “The Story Remains” (9/1/2023) continued the suffering of many peoples from record increases in the prices of goods and services in light of a global inflation wave that is the worst in decades, which experts attribute to high production costs, supply chain bottlenecks, and high energy and food prices due to the war in Ukraine and the Corona pandemic.

While the Arab region, countries and the world are waiting for an answer to the seriousness of the effects of inflation, the International Monetary Fund has drawn a bleak scenario for the global economy during the year 2023.

And this is in light of the slowdown in economic activity of the main global growth engines, the United States, Europe and China, and global inflation rates that have reached unprecedented levels in decades.

International warning

In this context, the Director of the International Monetary Fund, Kristalina Georgieva, warned that a third of the global economy will be subject to recession during this year, and the inflation rate will double in 2022, reaching 9%, after it was 4.7% in 2021.

The International Monetary Fund expected the inflation rate to reach 6.5% this year, and to decline next year to 4%.

The Fund also predicted a decline in the global growth rate this year to 2.7%, from 6% in 2021.

On the Arab level, Jawad al-Anani, the former Jordanian deputy prime minister for economic affairs, said that the countries of the Arab world should think about resolving their problems through regional understandings to overcome the economic crisis, explaining that the economies of Arab countries that were previously suffering from the remnants of wars were affected more, The same applies to Syria, Lebanon and Iraq.

He pointed out that the oil-producing countries are less harmful than economic inflation, because they are able to compensate themselves due to the increase in their exports of oil and gas, considering that the Gulf countries benefited from the global economic situation, although they were not seeking to do so.

The roots of the crisis

Regarding the roots of the economic crisis in the world, Mustafa Youssef, a researcher in political economy and director of the International Center for Development and Strategic Studies, said that the deterioration of living conditions in the countries of the world is mainly due to the rise in energy prices, as well as the rise in food prices and the production and import chains.

He also considered that resolving the crisis between America and China, as well as reducing tension in Russia's war on Ukraine, would reflect positively on lower prices, explaining that the beneficiaries of the absurd extension of the war in Ukraine are the arms companies and major oil companies that benefit from the high price of oil in the market.

As for Europe, Youssef believed that European countries should resolve their crisis with Russia this year, because the conflict with Russia was managed in a wrong way and unprecedented sanctions were imposed.

He also argued that Arab countries should fight corruption and develop development plans that care about people instead of infrastructure, considering that making people productive makes Arab countries achieve good rates of self-sufficiency, especially if resources are optimally used and small industries are supported.

Scary numbers

Despite optimism about some indicators of the good performance of the US economy, estimates of the growth rate of the largest global economy were pessimistic, as it is only 1% this year, after reaching about 6% in 2021.

As for China, the second largest global economy, expectations predict growth rates exceeding 4% for the current year, after it recorded a growth of more than 8% in 2021.

The largest decline in the expected growth rates will also be for the euro area, as the expected growth rate this year is estimated at only 0.5%, and growth in the euro area had recorded more than 5% in 2021.

It is expected that the economies of the Arab region will grow by 4.5% this year, but this growth will decline to more than 3% next year, and it had recorded 5% last year.

Poverty levels have risen in the Arab region to reach 30% of the population, in light of the high inflation rate, which reached 14% last year.