Seeing that Aruba does not come under the remark of special funds in IMF and World Bank. During the trip to attend the IMF Spring Meetings in Washington DC, Minister Maduro met with the representatives of the Kingdom of the Netherlands at the IMF, Mr. Paul Hilbers and at the World Bank, Mr. This is David. The president explained how Aruba’s recovery is going, what are the challenges ahead of us and indicated that Aruba, like many other countries, is looking for special funds to recover from the pandemic.
Minister Maduro explained that Aruba is looking for a way to better organize our external debt portfolio. Certainly for Aruba to have money on the international market, it is very important to organize our external debt in such a way that it does not affect our country’s ability to pay. Aruba has a good track record of paying its debts and is known in the market as a serious and prudent lender. However, in order to overcome the pandemic, Aruba has created a 916 million florins debt with the Netherlands that must be repaid. Aruba is looking for options to refinance this debt in a way that does not affect the country’s ability to pay. Noting that the IMF and World Bank have different programs to help countries overcome the damage caused by the pandemic, Minister Maduro decided to address the issue of refinancing Aruba’s debt in general and in particular the debt to the Netherlands with the representatives of the Kingdom of the Netherlands at the IMF and World Bank.
Aruba can count on assistance in the form of Technical Assistance
It should be noted that Aruba cannot count on special funds from the IMF or the World Bank to help in the recovery phase of the pandemic or to refinance its external debt. Because Aruba is part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and the Kingdom of the Netherlands is a donor of the IMF and World Bank, the countries within the Kingdom cannot count on the assistance from these special funds. The only place Aruba can count on is the assistance in the form of Technical Assistance from the IMF and World Bank. Aruba has been receiving a lot of technical assistance lately in the fiscal, budgetary field and counts every year with the economic and financial evaluation of the IMF’s Article IV Mission. Also this year, the World Bank will be assisting Aruba with an Expenditure Review, in which technical assistance is provided to review government spending and make recommendations on how to organize it more efficiently and effectively with the goal of reducing government spending.
