(Paris) The OECD slightly lowered its global growth forecast for 2021 on Wednesday and called for accelerating vaccine distribution and immunization, as the COVID-19 pandemic regains strength with the emergence of a new variant.
The world economy could grow 5.6% this year, anticipates the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development in its interim outlook, down 0.1 point compared to previous forecasts in September. She evokes “very different economic realities” between regions and believes that “the recovery will remain precarious” as long as we do not distribute the vaccines everywhere in the world.
The OECD slightly lowered its global growth forecast for 2021 on Wednesday, citing “very different economic realities” between regions, and called for accelerating the distribution of vaccines as the COVID-19 pandemic regains strength with the emergence of a new variant.
“The priority remains to ensure that vaccines are produced and distributed as quickly as possible across the world, including booster doses,” urged the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development in its mid-outlook conclusions. published on Wednesday.
“The recovery will remain precarious everywhere as long as this objective is not reached”, she added.
The OECD predicts 5.6% growth this year, down 0.1 point from the previous forecast in September. However, activity in 2022 would be the same as in previous forecasts, up 4.5%.
“Striking imbalances have appeared” in the wake of the recovery, underlines the Paris-based organization.
According to her, these differences are a reflection of inequalities in health systems, public policies, shortages of workers in certain sectors, and a price increase “more lasting than expected”.
For the euro zone, the OECD forecasts a slight decline in its 2021 growth forecast to 5.2%.
On the other hand, it expects an improvement for France with a GDP up 6.8% this year (+0.5 point) and 4.2% next year (+0.2), and for Italy. respectively up 6.3% (+0.4 point) and 4.6% (+0.5).
Germany is suffering for its part “shortages of key materials” for its industry and sees its forecast decline by 0.5 point next year to 4.1% but stabilize at 2.9% this year.
Regarding the United States, the OECD has again revised its expectations downwards, this time to 5.6% growth this year and 3.7% next year. “The current withdrawal of budget support is now having a negative impact,” she explains.
However, the OECD forecasts do not take into account the emergence of the Omicron variant, which appeared only a few days ago and whose consequences for the world economy are still uncertain.
In Asia, after having had a solid start to the year, China “stalled in the second half of the year,” says the OECD, which sees 8.1% growth this year and 5.1% next year , down 0.4 and 0.7 points.
On inflation, another major fear of the moment, the OECD predicts that price indices should peak by the end of the first quarter of next year in most advanced and emerging countries, before gradually declining.