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A Multi-dimensional Approach to the Post-COVID-19 World for Paraguay

image of A Multi-dimensional Approach to the Post-COVID-19 World for Paraguay

Paraguay has faced multiple shocks in the past five years as the COVID-19 pandemic was bookended by severe droughts that affected two key sectors, electricity production and agricultural production. The economy has demonstrated remarkable resilience during this period, supported by policy measures commensurate with the magnitude of the challenge, like the USD 2 billion fiscal response to the pandemic. These shocks have also exposed key underlying vulnerabilities in the country’s economy and development model, including reliance on agricultural exports, informality, limited revenue-raising capacity, and exposure to the consequences of climate change. The response and stimulus recognised these issues and found new ways to address or circumvent them, albeit in many cases not efficiently or permanently. This report draws lessons from policy measures implemented during the pandemic and recovery phase and applies them to current strategic challenges. In doing so, it highlights policy priorities to make Paraguay’s development path more inclusive, stronger and more resilient.

English

Foreword

In the past five years, multiple severe shocks have threatened the development trajectory of Latin American countries. The COVID-19 pandemic, the ensuing global economic downturn, and the global consequences of Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine have brought new challenges and exposed existing vulnerabilities in the development models of the countries in the Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) region. The COVID-19 pandemic was a momentous shock, and the immediate response measures taken by most LAC governments to alleviate its impact on health systems, households, workers and firms was ambitious. The response also included important policy innovations to effectively mitigate, and sometimes address, major structural vulnerabilities. Although these measures were seldom sustainable or fully efficient, they harbour lessons for adjusting the medium to long-term development strategy of the countries of the region.

English

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