{"id":395840,"date":"2026-01-08T20:21:17","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T20:21:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/395840\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T20:21:17","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T20:21:17","slug":"zambia-abandons-imf-loan-programme-extension","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/395840\/","title":{"rendered":"Zambia abandons IMF loan programme extension"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanaweb.com\/GhanaHomePage\/business\/Zambia-abandons-IMF-loan-programme-extension-2016464?gallery=1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/71793247.295.jpg\" alt=\"The logo of the International Monetary Fund\" title=\"The logo of the International Monetary Fund\" width=\"295\" height=\"174\" \/> <\/a>The logo of the International Monetary Fund<\/p>\n<p id=\"article-123\">Zambia has ditched plans to extend its International Monetary Fund loan programme before the scheduled expiration at the end of this month, the fund said on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;While the authorities initially requested a one-year extension of the Extended Credit Facility (ECF) arrangement, they have since informed the IMF team that they will not pursue this option,&#8221; an IMF spokesperson said.<\/p>\n<p>The programme was agreed in 2022 to help Zambia restore debt sustainability after its 2020 default.<\/p>\n<p>The sixth and final review under the arrangement is expected to be considered by the fund&#8217;s executive board at the end of January.<\/p>\n<p>Zambia had hoped to secure about $145 million in additional funding through the extension.<\/p>\n<p>No reason was given for the decision, which comes as President Hakainde Hichilema&#8217;s government prepares for elections in August while facing double-digit inflation.<\/p>\n<p>The government forecast an improved fiscal picture for 2026, estimating that the budget deficit would shrink by more than half and that economic growth would rise above 6%, following years of protracted debt restructuring negotiations and a severe drought.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The logo of the International Monetary Fund Zambia has ditched plans to extend its International Monetary Fund loan&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395841,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[28,101],"class_list":{"0":"post-395840","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-economy"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395840"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395840\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395841"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}