President Mohamed Nasheed has today met with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission to review the IMF programme in the Maldives under its Stand-by Arrangement and Exogenous Shock Facility to assist economic recovery in the Maldives.
At the meeting held at the President’s Office, the President said he was encouraged by the success of recent fiscal and monetary policy measures in the government.
In this regard, he underlined commencement of collecting Tourism Goods and Services Tax from January this year.
He said the government was encouraged that total revenue from TGST in the first month significantly surpassed the projected tax revenue for the month.
Further, he added it was clear, from TGST revenue of the first month alone, that the total revenue from tourism sector was over US$2 billion, contrary to previous estimates of total revenue from tourism – around US$700 million.
At the meeting, the President also reiterated that decentralization, despite higher expenditure at the early stages, would eventually save the country more than when the services were administered centrally.
The President said the Maldives has benefited from its engagement with the IMF and would continue to increase the country’s engagement with the IMF.
Rodrigo Cubero, the IMF Mission Chief, also said the IMF would continue engaging with the Maldives.
The President and the IMF mission held extensive discussions on possible additional measures to speed up the economic recovery in the Maldives.
The IMF Misson, in addition to Mission Chief Cubero, also included the IMF Alternate Executive Director Sami Geadah.
The meeting was attended by Vice President Dr Mohamed Waheed, Special Envoy of the President Ibrahim Hussain Zaki, Acting Minister of Finance and Treasury Mahmood Razi, and Deputy Governor of the Maldives Monetary Authority Aishath Zahira.
