Technical assistance activities expand in response to member countries' needs

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The IMF provides technical assistance to its member countries in areas within its core mandate- namely, macroeconomic policy, monetary and foreign exchange policy and systems, fiscal policy and management, external debt, and macroeconomic statistics.

The IMF began to extend technical assistance to its members in 1964 in response to requests from newly independent African and Asian countries for help in establishing their own central banks and ministries of finance.

The IMF's technical assistance activities grew rapidly and, by the mid-1980s, the number of staff members devoted to these activities had almost doubled. In the 1990s, many countries--those of the former Soviet Union as well as a number of countries in eastern Europe--moved from command to market-oriented economies, turning to the IMF for technical assistance.

The IMF has also helped countries and territories establish governmental institutions following severe civil unrest--for example, in Angola, Cambodia, East Timor,Haiti, Kosovo, Lebanon,Namibia, Rwanda, and Yemen. The IMF's technical assistance has grown from almost 70 person-years in 1970 to about 300 personyears annually by 2000 and represents about 15 percent of the IMF's total administrative expenditures.

Types of technical assistance

The IMF provides technical assistance in three broad areas:

* designing and implementing fiscal and monetary policies;

* drafting and reviewing economic and financial legislation, regulations, and procedures, thereby helping to resolve difficulties that often lie at the heart of macroeconomic imbalances; and

* institution and capacity building, such as in central banks, treasuries, tax and customs departments, and statistical services.

Technical assistance is provided through missions and short- and long-term assignments of experts to institutions in member countries. In addition, the IMF trains officials from its member countries through courses offered at its headquarters in Washington, as well as at the Joint Vienna Institute, the Singapore Training Institute, the Joint Africa Institute, the Joint Regional Training Center for Latin America, and other regional and subregional locations.

Assistance is provided through several IMF departments.

The Monetary and Exchange Affairs Department focuses on central banking and exchange system issuesPage 15 as well as on designing or improving monetary policy instruments. Its...