Qatar Economic Outlook Issue Number 13

Qatar Economic Outlook 2021 - 2023 
50 
production, (2) and the level of demand by 
the major industrialized countries, which was 
clear during the economic downturn resulting 
from the Covid-19 crisis in the middle of 
2020, and is currently going through a third 
phase resulting from the recovery of demand 
and supply, as the average index during the 
period January-October 2021 amounted to 
about 59.4%. 
Attributable to fluctuations in oil and gas 
prices, the fiscal balance declined in 2017 
by 4.7% of GDP, but it grew during 2018 
and 2019, with an average of 2.2% of the 
GDP, before declining in 2020 by 1.5%.
With the improvement in oil and gas prices 
during the first three quarters of 2021, the 
fiscal data for the same period showed that 
the budget balance achieved a surplus of 
1.02% of GDP. 
Similarly, the current account of the balance 
of payments during the period (2017-2019) 
witnessed an average growth of about 5.2% 
of GDP, i.e., at a maximum of 9.1% of GDP 
and a minimum of 2.4% of GDP, before 
declining in 2020 by 2.5% of GDP. With the 
improvement in oil and gas prices during the 
first three quarters of 2021, the most recent 
data for the Balance of Payment during the 
same period shows that the current account 
balance achieved a surplus of 11.7% of GDP.

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Part 2 - Economic Performance 2017 - 2020 
 
51 
COVID-19 Impacts on Global 
Economy
During the period March 2020 – November 
2021 (and continuing), the global economy 
has undergone drastic changes due to the 
ramifications of Covid-19 containment 
measures, which have been taken by all 
countries without exception in order to save 
societies from the pandemic, and to enhance 
the capacity of health facilities to receive all 
infected cases. Given that there is no trade-
off between protecting lives and protecting 
economies, many governments around the 
world adopted economic stimulus policies to 
deal with the repercussions of the pandemic 
on both health and the economy. 
Based 
on 
developments 
in 
the 
implementation of economic policies at the 
global level, particularly by the superpowers, 
several research centres, institutions and 
international banks routinely amend their 
assumptions when making their periodic 
forecasts. It is clear from Table (2-3) that the 
International 
Monetary 
Fund 
(IMF), 
according to the various editions of its World 
Economic Outlook report (WEO) during the 
same period, amended its estimates of the Y-
o-Y rate of change of economic growth for the 
year 2020 several times. Initially, in October 
2019, the WEO estimated that the global 
economy can be expected to grow by about 
3.4%. Then, with the beginning of the 
emergence of the Sars-CoV-2 (Covid-19) 
virus in China and its subsequent spread to 
all countries of the world, the IMF estimated 
in the April 2020 WEO that the global 
economy would decline by about 3%. Yet, as 
the global crisis intensified, it was estimated 
in the October 2020 WEO to decline to 
negative 4.4%. However, with the 
improvement of the economies of the United 
States and China during Quarter Four (Q4) of 
2020, and according to estimates for January 
2021, the decline rose slightly to become 
negative 3.5%. 
Furthermore, considering the progress that 
the world achieved in confronting the 
consequences of Covid-19 during Q1 of 
2021, much enhanced by the production of 
Covid-19 vaccines and the roll-out of 
vaccination campaigns in all countries, the 
IMF again modified some of its estimates for 
the global economic performance for 2020 in 
the April 2021 WEO, to arrive at a measure 
of the global economic decline at negative 
3.3%, before stabilizing in its July 2021 
edition at negative 3.2% and then in its 
October 2021 edition at negative 3.1% 
Similarly, the 
IMF has 
several times 
revised its 
estimates of 
the 
economies of 
the Middle 
East countries 
and the Gulf 
Cooperation 
Council 
countries for 
2020, 
including the