This meeting is taking place a little over one year after the start of the COVID-19 crisis, which has been characterised by its global scale, unprecedented intensity, high persistence and a very marked differential impact across sectors, countries and population groups. Currently, there are hopeful signs alongside causes for concern. On the positive side, the roll-out of the vaccination process, and the gradual approval of new vaccines and a brisker pace of manufacture and distribution, allow us to discern a scenario entailing the resolution of the health crisis and, consequently, the prolongation of the incipient economic recovery. Indeed, the latest IMF forecasts published last week envisage an upward revision of the forecast for global growth, compared with its projections in January. The latest figures highlight the buoyancy of the world’s two biggest economies, the United States and China, which will be among the few to have attained their prepandemic level of GDP before the end of this year. However, this favourable outlook runs in parallel with high uncertainty on several fronts. First, epidemiologically speaking, the emergence of new strains of the virus and doubts over the effectiveness of vaccines against them, coupled with the uneven pace of progress in the different countries’ vaccination calendars, raise questions about when we will manage to fully resolve the health crisis. And this unevenness, accompanied by other country-based idiosyncratic factors, is giving rise to appreciable and growing divergences in the pace of economic recovery globally.

Macro prudential policies in EMEs are even more important than before due to the divergent monetary policies in AEs. 6  BIS central bankers’ speeches  The Central Bank of Turkey’s roadmap of policy actions before and after global monetary policy normalization The Turkish economy has shown a relatively robust performance in the face of major external and internal shocks. GDP growth is estimated at around 4 percent in 2015 with an expected gradual strengthening of economic activity in 2016 and in 2017 (Figure 12). The rise in GDP growth rate observed in 2015 is mostly attributed to strong private consumption. Private investment recorded a moderate recovery. The challenging external conditions especially geopolitical events in the region have adversely affected exports. However, the economic recovery in most EU member states enabled Turkey to largely compensate its loss in other exports markets as Turkey increased exports to the EU countries by more than 10 percent in euro terms in 2015. This outcome also highlights Turkish exporters’ resiliency in adopting to adverse economic conditions. Of course, probably the most significant development of the last year or so has been the sharp decline in oil prices. Turkey, being an energy importing country, benefited from lower oil prices in many dimensions. The current account deficit fell from $ billion in June 2014 to below $ billion in November 2015 in 12 month cumulative terms. This sharp improvement in the current account balances has also been greatly helped by prudent macro-economic polices including monetary, macro-prudential and fiscal policies.