We had three reasons to believe that the SSA economies would be rather resilient facing the Covid-19 pandemic. We were referring to a foreseeable natural immunity of the Region citizens, to a pressure on the authorities to ease the barrier measures as well as to a limited exposure of SSA’s countries to the tourism sector. Finally, the indicators show that, faced with Covid-19, the Region is no exception. SSA would have lost 7.4% overall growth expected in 2020, going from a pre-Covid-19 growth level of + 3.0% to -4.4% 12 months later. As a matter of fact, the weight of fall in commodity prices, a narrowed leeway in the implementation of fiscal and monetary stimulus and a resumption of tensions weighed heavily on the growth indicators of SSA countries.
