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By Sanna Camara
The Governor of the Central Bank of The Gambia has announced that country’s gross official reserves have reached 4.2 months of imports of goods and services in August 2017.
Mr Bakary Jammeh told journalists at the Montary Policy Committee meeting on Friday that such a rare improvement has not occurred in the country in a very long time. Usually, the reserves stand at 2 to three months of imports cover, he said.
Mr Jammeh attributed this “rare improvement” to the “unwavering support of development partners, especially the IMF, World Bank, EU and the ADB.”
He said international reserves improved from $19.84million in Dec to $112.2million in August 2017.
Quasi money increased by 24.2 % to D13.0 billion during same period.
Growth of reserve money remained same at 16.1% in June 2017.
Balnce of Payment estimates, a surplus of 3.2million compared to $1.0millin from last year.
Current account balance improved from a deficit of $38.4 million in first half of 2016 to a deficit of $36.8million.
They decided to maintain the policy rate at 15%.
Jammeh also said at such a “comfortable” state of the economy at a lean economic season, the prospects a even better with the coming of the tourism and agriculture season.
“Central Bank may not even have to borrow from the commercial banks. Rather, we will be selling our excess forex reserves to them,” he said.
