7 %. 3 / 5 bis - central bankers'speeches the contrast between the strong depreciation of the colombian peso in the last two years and what happened in the main countries of the region with which we usually compare ourselves can be explained in part by the relative deterioration in our country's fiscal soundness, which led to the loss of its investment grade in 2021. recently, a better perspective of fiscal adjustment has been seen with the 2022 tax reform and the announcements of the financial plan regarding compliance with the adjustment plan contemplated in the fiscal rule, which contributed to the colombian peso appreciation of last december and january in a favorable international environment. however, it must be recognized that uncertainty about the future of oil and coal exploration and exploitation has kept the exchange rate highly vulnerable to international events. it also helps to explain that in international situations of greater risk aversion, such as the one observed this week, the colombian peso suffers more significant depreciations than other currencies in the region. inflation outlook what is the outlook for inflation for 2023 and 2024? the first thing i must say is that banco de la republica is strongly committed to creating the necessary conditions for returning inflation to the target. the bank's technical team's projections suggest that, although by the end of this year, we would still have the permissible range of 3. 0 % + / 1. 0 %, we would reach that range by the end of 2024. as we stated in the press release issued after the last meeting of the bank's board of directors, with the decision to increase the policy interest rate by 75 bps last january, the monetary policy approached the position required to induce in the medium term a convergence of inflation towards its 3. 0 % target. indeed, the uncertainty is considerable, and future decisions will depend on the information we have at any given time. however, in our central scenario, we expect inflation to be approaching a decreasing path, which would initially be driven by a substantial reduction in the growth rate of food prices. core inflation would continue showing increases for the rest of this semester. still, the outlook is that in the second half of the year, it will also start to show a decreasing trend, reinforcing the behavior of food prices and helping the convergence process toward the target. this process would continue throughout 2024. surely there is great uncertainty, and there are risks in projections such as those described. in addition, those

microcredit cases, the latest data show higher growth rates than in previous months. 4. these trends are part of the adjustment process of demand to sustainable levels. it is well - known that the projections of banco de la republica's technical staff for economic growth in 2023 are among the lowest of all analysts. it is estimated that this growth would only be 0. 2 %. however, it is important to note that, even with such low growth, the levels of activity that we would have in 2023 would be relatively high. actually, the adjustment in the growth rate between 2022 and 2023 is largely due to a base effect. therefore, if we compare the cumulative growth of colombian gdp to prepandemic levels, our performance would remain broadly favorable with respect to other countries in the region. on the other hand, it is worth noting that the labor market is performing relatively well in the context of the recent slowdown in growth. indicators to december for the country's urban areas show an annual growth rate of the employed population of 7. 5 % in the 13 main cities. however, this increase has been partially offset by a less positive employment performance in rural areas and the seats of the smallest municipalities. this phenomenon is probably associated with poor performance in agricultural and livestock production. on the other hand, the number of salaried employees at the national level shows an above - average growth, reflecting a dynamism of formal employment that is confirmed in the data on the number of contributors to the integrated social security contribution form ( pila in spanish ). 2 / 5 bis - central bankers'speeches inflation and expectations moving on to the inflation performance, the figures released last weekend for january show that, unfortunately, the adjustment process in demand has not yet begun to be reflected in inflation performance, which continues to rise. total inflation now stands at 13. 25 % and keeps being driven by food prices, rising to 26. 2 %, which is particularly high when we consider that food prices were already rising at 19. 9 % in january 2022. this means that in the last two years, food price levels have increased by more than 50. 0 %, which implies an increase in the relative price of this item of the family basket considerably greater than what can be explained by global factors. in part, this increase could be associated with purely sectoral supply factors, which would also explain the poor performance of the agricultural and livestock sector in a year in which all other