International Monetary Fund warned that the greatest dangers facing the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council, limited the possibility of slowing the pace of global economic growth and can produce it from crude oil prices remain at low levels for a long time. He called on Member States to focus as a top priority in the short term, to support their financial sectors as a hedge against possible negative consequences of sovereign debt crisis in developed countries.

The warning came in a report by the Department of Middle East and Central Asia in the International Monetary Fund yesterday and got «life», a copy of it, for the latest developments in the effects of the global financial crisis on the Gulf Cooperation Council, and future challenges faced by Member States: Saudi Arabia and the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar and Oman and Bahrain.

Surprised the experts Fund Economic Research, happened when the world economic outlook Wednesday before last, not to rule out the possibility of isolation of the current recovery, but also to enhance the growth rate in the current year to 4.6 percent versus 4.2 percent in April (April) last year. But the optimism did not extend to the energy markets when they saw the price of oil dropped by 36 percent in 2009, will rise in 2010, an average of 22 percent, not 30 percent as expected.

In addition to reducing the percentage of the expected increase in oil prices, the IMF did not rule out the likely effect on economic growth in the GCC countries in the short term, adversely challenges faced by the financial sector, especially in the UAE and Kuwait. He stressed that the challenges imposed by the global crisis «It would be subject to treatment and will not affect growth prospects in the long term».

According to experts, the Fund received in the GCC countries continue to support the growth of economies in the current year, through programs of economic stimulus, especially in Saudi Arabia, UAE and Kuwait. They pointed out that the expected growth rate of the non-oil economic sectors, will strengthen the achievement of 4.3 percent. They noted that oil production, which fell sharply during the global crisis, will rise about 5 per cent, boosted by the expected path of the world recovery.

The experts explained that the strong economic incentive programs and ambitious adopted by the Governments of Member States of the Cooperation Council, managed to protect GCC economies from the devastating effects of the global crisis. They pointed in this context that Saudi Arabia has adopted, and despite the sharp decline in revenues from oil exports, the largest program of government spending (as a percentage of GDP), among Member States of the Group of Twenty.

They pointed out that the global crisis and its repercussions on the credit activity of international damaged sectors in the GCC, embodied most of its manifestations, in most GCC countries, the decline in real estate prices and declining corporate profits and financial institutions registered a significant increase in loan defaulting, as well as for the indicators of Gulf bourses stirred by the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009, but still below pre-crisis levels.

The IMF experts pointed out that the Gulf banks have had only a growth «anime» in the areas of activity to attract deposits and credit in the first half of the current year, with limited success in attracting deposits of the private sector and continued to receive huge liquidity received from the public sector.

They noted that high levels of liquidity and low interest rates in the GCC financial institutions, did not translate into robust growth in lending for reasons attributable primarily to a decline in risk appetite in the banks. But they emphasized that several factors, notably the uncertain global economy and the bankruptcy of two giant Saudetyn and the problems of the financial sector of Kuwait and Dubai World debt crisis contributed to the total decline in risk appetite in the banks and borrowers in the Gulf.

Experts suggested the IMF to «strengthen the financial sectors of the Gulf, without narrowing the channels of the flow of credit too much remains a priority for the Gulf Cooperation Council in the short term», stressing that «Member States have huge amounts of foreign assets available to mitigate the effects of any new shocks facing, especially the vulnerability of these countries the financial repercussions of developments in Dubai and Greece is expected to remain limited ».