There is not a country that has escaped the combined economic shocks of Covid-19 and the global spike in oil and food prices triggered by Russia’s continuing invasion of Ukraine. Painful for wealthy countries, for low- to middle-income countries it risks being existential. Sri Lanka – mired in crisis – last week defaulted on its debt for the first time in its history.
While its collapsing economy is as much a product of its corrupt politics as of global economic trends, Sri Lanka is also a worrying bellwether for the instability elsewhere that may be triggered by declining economic security in countries with high levels of poverty.
