Hanging Out to Dry? Long-term Macroeconomic Effects of Drought in Fragile and Conflict-Affected States

Kalin Tintchev and Laura Jaramillo

No 2024/106, IMF Working Papers from International Monetary Fund

Abstract: Using a comprehensive drought measure and a panel autoregressive distributed lag model, the paper finds that worsening drought conditions can result in long-term scarring of real GDP per capita growth and affect long-term price stability in Fragile and Conflict-Affected States (FCS), more so than in other countries, leaving them further behind. Lower crop productivity and slower investment are key channels through which drought impacts economic growth in FCS. In a high emissions scenario, drought conditions will cut 0.4 percentage points of FCS’ growth of real GDP per capita every year over the next 40 years and increase average inflation by 2 percentage points. Drought will also increase hunger in FCS, from alreay high levels. The confluence of lower food production and higher prices in a high emissions scenario would push 50 million more people in FCS into hunger. The macroeconomic effects of drought in FCS countries are amplified by their low copying capacity due to high public debt, low social spending, insufficient trade openness, high water insecurity, and weak governance.

Keywords: climate change; long-term growth and inflation; climate policy; drought condition; FCS country; FCS group specification; drought measure; FCS' growth; Natural disasters; Food production; Productivity; Global; Sub-Saharan Africa (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 31
Date: 2024-05-24
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr, nep-dev, nep-env and nep-mac
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