Global Finance, an American magazine known for its rankings of the best financial institutions in the world, has ranked the Democratic Republic of Congo as the fourth poorest nation in the world.
The DRC has the sad privilege of being in the top 5 poorest countries in the world as the nation, blessed with abundant mineral resources, faces turbulent economic situation.
The rankings, which have become a standard of excellence around the world and recognized for their reliability, are
developed based on the GDP per capita as shown in a recent IMF report.
According to the report, the DRC’s average annual purchasing power per capita sits at less than $1,500 and the worst part is that poverty is often likely to lead to more poverty.
In the latest World Economic Outlook, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) explains how DRC and other poor countries could fall into hardship even further.
“Declining growth implies a deterioration in prospects or living standards and a reduction in global poverty. A persistently low-growth environment, coupled with high interest rates, would threaten debt sustainability and could fuel social tensions and hamper the green transition. In addition, expectations of lower growth can discourage investment in capital and technology and thus, in part, become self-fulfilling.”
In the ranking, the African continent is generally at the bottom of the table, even if some countries manage to do well compared to their previous rankings.
The DRC has in the past five years under the leadership of Félix Tshisekedi seen the economy deteriorate with the nation’s currency, franc, performing at its worst rate against the dollar in history.
