IMF mission to visit crisis-hit Serbia next week: Report

BELGRADE: A mission of the International Monetary Fund will visit Serbia next week for talks on a new stand-by arrangement with the country hit hard by the global financial crisis, a minister said on Wednesday.

"The IMF mission is to arrive in Belgrade on Monday, March 16, to start talks on a new arrangement with Serbia," Mladjan Dinkic, deputy prime minister for the economy, was quoted as saying by Beta news agency.

Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic said earlier this month that Serbia would seek a two-million dollar (1.5-million-euro) arrangement with the IMF to support its worsening balance of payments and currency.

The Serbian dinar has lost more than 25 percent of its value since the global financial crisis began to bite foreign investors in late 2008.

Belgrade has slashed its gross domestic product (GDP) growth forecast to between 0.5 and 1.0 percent for 2009, compared with the 6.0 percent predicted before the crisis.

It hopes that under the new IMF arrangement, the budget deficit will be set at 3.0 percent of GDP instead of the 1.5 percent agreed earlier with the Fund, while inflation would surpass the target of 8.0 percent.

The International Monetary Fund's executive board approved a 530-million-dollar stand-by loan in January to help Serbia cope with the downturn.