The global economy continues to recover in Q2 2021 following the deep economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. The growth accelerated as a result of the easing of virus-containment restrictions in most countries. IMF (July 2021) estimates that global GDP growth will reach 6% year over year (y/y) in 2021. Though this rebound is uneven – compared to the previous estimates (April 2021), growth projections for emerging markets and developing economies are revised downward.

ISET’s is pleased to announce that two of our lead economists, Yasya Babych and Luc Leruth, have teamed up to create their latest blog (Balancing ‘Maintenance’ and ‘Investment’) alongside Christiane Roehler, a Senior Economist at IMF. Their blog is currently available directly on the IMF’s blog platform.

According to the preliminary statistics released by GeoStat, Georgia’s real GDP contracted by 3.8% year over year (y/y) in Q3 2020. As a result, the estimated real GDP declined by 5.0% in the first nine months of 2020, which is in line with the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) and National Bank of Georgia’s (NBG) latest projections of -5% y/y (from October and November correspondingly).

ISET is proud to welcome Mr. Luc Leruth, a professional of considerable academic experience who has worked for many years in financial institutions, to the ISET Policy Institute as one of its Lead Economists. A native of Belgium, Mr. Leruth previously worked as the Director of a number of the IMF's Technical Assistance Centres in Africa and the Pacific region.

According to Geostat, the 2019 real GDP growth in Georgia was 5.1% year-over-year (YoY). This figure moderately surpassed NBG’s, ADB’s, EBRD’s, IMF’s and the World Bank’s latest growth projections for 2019, which range from 4.5%-4.7%. However, the real winner in this race was ISET-PI’s annual GDP growth forecast; in May 2019, we predicted a 4.9% annual growth.