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IMF Forces African Countries To Privatise Water
Article by Rainer Chr. Hennig, afrol.com May be reproduced freely with source reference to http://www.afrol.com afrol.com, 8 February - A review of IMF loan policies in forty random countries reveals that, during 2000, IMF loan agreements in 12 countries included conditions imposing water privatization or full cost recovery. In general, it is African countries, and the smallest, poorest and most debt-ridden countries that are being subjected to
IMF conditions on water privatization and full cost recovery.
Ironically, the majority of these loans were negotiated under the IMF's new Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF), says Sara Grusky from the
Globalization Challenge Initiative http://www.challengeglobalization.org]. The reform was announced with great fanfare in 1999 when IMF officials claimed that the new loan facility would re-focus the IMF's controversial structural
adjustment measures on activities that borrowing government's would identify as leading to poverty reduction (...).
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