IMF's 2024 GDP Growth Projection Highest For India at 6.8%; Germany, South Africa Weakest

IMF said global growth, estimated at 3.2 per cent in 2023, is projected to continue at the same pace in 2024 and 2025.

Even as India has a high domestic demand and a rising working-age population, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has projected the country’s economic growth rate for 2024 at 6.8 per cent, which is the highest among the major economies in the world. It is followed by China (4.6 per cent) and Nigeria (3.3 per cent).

“Growth in India is projected to remain strong at 6.8 per cent in 2024 and 6.5 per cent in 2025, with the robustness reflecting continuing strength in domestic demand and a rising working-age population,” the IMF said in its ‘World Economic Outlook April 2024’.

The 6.8 per cent GDP growth projection for India for 2024 is also way higher than the global growth estimate of 3.2 per cent.

IMF’s latest growth forecast for 2024:

India: 6.8%

China: 4.6%

Nigeria: 3.3%

Russia: 3.2%

US: 2.7%

Mexico: 2.4%

Saudi Arabia: 2.6%

Brazil: 2.2%

Spain: 1.9%

Japan: 0.9%

Italy: 0.7%

France: 0.7%

UK: 0.5%

South Africa: 0.9%

Germany: 0.2%.

On global growth, the IMF said global growth, estimated at 3.2 per cent in 2023, is projected to continue at the same pace in 2024 and 2025. The forecast for 2024 is revised up by 0.1 percentage point from the January 2024 World Economic Outlook (WEO) Update, and by 0.3 percentage point from the October 2023 WEO.

“The pace of expansion is low by historical standards, owing to both near-term factors, such as still-high borrowing costs and withdrawal of fiscal support, and longer-term effects from the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine; weak growth in productivity; and increasing geoeconomic fragmentation,” it added.

Global headline inflation is expected to fall from an annual average of 6.8 per cent in 2023 to 5.9 per cent in 2024 and 4.5 per cent in 2025, with advanced economies returning to their inflation targets sooner than emerging market and developing economies.