Dubai – Mubasher:  Oil-exporting countries are expected to grow 3.5% in 2016, with no change predicted for this year, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Monday.

Growth in oil-exporting countries registered 2.5% in 2014, the IMF said.

In its Regional Economic Outlook (REO): Middle East and Central Asia issued on Tuesday, the IMF said the projected growth is based on assumptions for stable security statuses and an improvement in oil-producing countries outside the GCC.

Masood Ahmed, director of the IMF’s Middle East and Central Asia Department, said that oil-exporting countries have succeeded in maintaining significant growth levels despite the oil price slide between July 2014 and April 2015. This growth was due to countries using financial reserves accumulated over the past 10 years.

These countries are suffering a major weakness in exporting revenues, Ahmed said during the IMF conference held in Dubai on Tuesday, adding that the continued oil price decline will turn the surplus that oil-exporting countries in the MENA region achieved a long time ago, into a deficit of $22 billion in 2015.

Export revenues are expected to drop by $380 billion compared to expectations before oil prices fell, he added.

According to the REO report, the budgets of oil-exporting countries have been greatly affected by the sharp drop in oil prices as the general financial credit retreats to a deficit of 8.5% of gross domestic product (GDP) on average.

The massive rise in spending levels over the past few years has made general budgets liable to being affected by the oil price decline, Ahmed noted, adding that most countries in the region cannot reach stability in their general budgets if oil prices near $60 per barrel.