(Ecofin Agency) - The increase in country quotas is intended to enable the Fund to mobilize more financing for countries facing a debt crisis, and to better finance the fight against global warming.

In a press release issued on Tuesday November 7, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced that its Executive Board had approved a proposal to increase country quotas by 50% at its next review, scheduled for June 2025.

This approval represents the first step in the process to increase quotas, a wish expressed by the Fund and member states at the last Annual Meetings of the IMF and World Bank (WB), held last October in Marrakech (Morocco).

“An adequately resourced IMF is essential to safeguard global financial stability and respond to members’ potential needs in an uncertain and shock-prone world,” IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said after the Executive Board’s decision.

“The proposal envisages that once quota increases are in effect, borrowed resources comprising the Bilateral Borrowing Agreements and New Arrangements to Borrow (NAB) would be reduced to maintain the Fund’s current lending capacity,” the IMF statement said.

An increase in quotas means an increase in the Fund's capital, which means an increase in the money made available by States, in proportion to their share in the institution's capital.

A few years ago, the IMF's Executive Board committed itself to increasing quotas, to provide the Fund with additional resources to make available to many countries facing a debt crisis or at risk of facing one in the near future, and to better finance the fight against global warming. Quotas correspond to the overall position of each member country in the global economy. They are denominated in Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), the IMF's unit of account.

Member countries, mainly through the payment of their quotas, provide the IMF with the money it lends them on its best, so-called non-concessional, terms. Quota resources can be supplemented by multilateral and bilateral lending arrangements, which play a major role in the IMF's support for member countries in times of crisis.

Estimated at around SDR 983 billion at the end of June 2023, the IMF's total available resources represent a lending capacity of around SDR 696 billion, or around $925 billion.