The coronavirus pandemic could erase two decades of progress in eradicating poverty in the Asia-Pacific region as it threatens to send the global economy into a deep recession, according to the International Finance Corporation, which provides financing for private sector companies in developing markets.
“Our biggest concern is the loss of jobs,” Pathak told the South China Morning Post. “If the situation were to continue to deteriorate, we would have close to 11 million people going back into poverty.” On Tuesday, the International Monetary Fund said the global economy is “very likely” to experience its worst recession since the Great Depression and surpass the contraction and job losses seen during the global financial crisis in 2008.
Charles Dumas, chief economist at independent research firm TS Lombard, said the status of the pandemic in emerging market countries other than China – where the first reports of infections emerged late last year – is lagging behind developed countries by three weeks or more. “Typically, these are small outfits. They don't have a lot of cushion,” Pathak said. “A few days, a few weeks of disruption means it’s hard for them to operate. They’ve been hit very hard from what we’re hearing. Our prime objective is how do we keep the financial sector continuing to operate and provide liquidity to them.”
“We have been working with a lot of new clients in the past few months,” Pathak said. “We’re accelerating our push to move faster to work with these clients because almost anybody and everybody has been affected by the virus.”
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