Under the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, the average growth rate in the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) could see a reduction of nearly 4%, to 2.7% against 6.6% initially forecast, said Monday in Abidjan, Alassane Ouattara, President of Côte d'Ivoire and also current President of the Conference of Heads of State and Government of the regional organization.

"The average growth rate in the Union would be around 2.7%, a reduction of nearly 4% compared to the initial forecast of 6.6%," Ouattara said at an extraordinary session by videoconference of WAEMU heads of state and government devoted to COVID-19.

Ouattara said the health crisis will have a "direct negative impact" on each member country's economic growth and public finances in 2020.

"The current pandemic, added to the security crisis in our region, is having economic, social and humanitarian effects on all member states," he said.

As of April 22, the WAEMU zone, which has eight countries sharing the CFA franc (FCFA), has recorded about 3,200 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 105 deaths related to the disease, with a case fatality rate of 3.3%.

According to Mr. Alassane, the continuation of the pandemic "until the end of the year" could lead the economies of the WAEMU zone to "enter recession and thus significantly reduce the capacity of the various States to fight against poverty and terrorism".

The Ivorian president asked his counterparts to "act quickly" and take measures on the health, economic and social levels to mitigate the consequences of the crisis on the economies of their respective countries.

The cost of urgent measures and response plans, in order to limit the impact of this health crisis on people's lives, employment and the productive sector, has been estimated at about 5.285 billion CFA francs (about 8.74 billion US dollars) for all WAEMU member countries.

At the end of the opening ceremony and the closed-door work, Ouattara said the meeting was an opportunity to define a common strategy to fight the pandemic and give guidance to regional institutions and government teams for its implementation.

The common strategy must include, inter alia, the establishment of greater coordination between States, the swift adoption by the government and institutions of the Union of all the measures that would prove necessary to reduce the impact of the pandemic on the populations, and support for the subregional economy during and after the crisis.