UPDATE 1-IMF's board approves $625-million loan deal for Chad

The program, finalized in May between Central African officials and IMF staff, aims to ensure Chad's fiscal sustainability, create room for development projects, expand targeted social spending to fight poverty, and enhance governance and the business environment to promote private sector growth, the IMF said.

The International Monetary Fund's executive board approved Chad's $625-million lending programme for four years, including an immediate disbursement of $38.5 million, the IMF said in a statement on Friday. The program, finalized in May between Central African officials and IMF staff, aims to ensure Chad's fiscal sustainability, create room for development projects, expand targeted social spending to fight poverty, and enhance governance and the business environment to promote private sector growth, the IMF said. That will in turn help with implementing an ambitious national development blueprint that requires $30 billion in public and private investment in sectors such as roads, electricity, and the digital economy.

The plan, due to be launched in Abu Dhabi in September, should lead to average annual economic growth of 8% and help keep the debt level at 32% of gross domestic product over the 2025-2030 period, the country's finance minister said in June. Chad, whose junta leader was sworn in after an election last year, has been under pressure from declining oil prices, development assistance cuts, and regional instability. It hosts hundreds of thousands of refugees from Sudan's civil war who live in dire shelter conditions due to funding shortages.

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