The local consulting firm Indesa made more pessimistic forecasts, setting the fall at 18 percent, while the US risk evaluator Fitch Ratings put it at 17.7 and in turn rated investments in the country in the negative, although it maintained the grade of trustworthiness.
The Covid-19 pandemic, whose first case in the country was reported on March 9th, led to a first total quarantine, with the paralysis of almost all economic activities until June, with the exception of the interoceanic canal and basic services.
Before the start of the still ongoing health crisis, Panama was in the process of an economic slowdown, but according to specialists in 2020 there was to be a turnaround and a return to the economic rise that lead the country to average 4.5 percent of GDP in the five-year period prior to the pandemic.
On the other hand, the optimistic predictions for 2021 that the economy would grow by 5.5 percent of GDP have been frustrated so far with the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, which forced mobility restrictions, temporary closure of companies and the postponement of reanimation, which are resuming timidly these days.
Not only that, but Panama’s public debt grew by six billion dollars in 2020, having had increased already in January by another 2,450 billion in support of this year’s budget, the MEF reported.