06 IFI COVID Relief and Reconstruction Support for Uganda With government registering a huge decline in domestic revenue collections because of the economic disruptions caused by the pandemic, it sought loans and grants from International Financial Institutions (IFIs) to fill up its deficit in financing. The country borrowed to a tune of $889 million USD in 2020. This included a $492 million from the IMF and a $300 million loan from the World Bank. The country also acquired another huge loan worth $1 billion USD in 2021 from the IMF and further sought $200 million from World Bank to expand access to high speed and affordable internet within the same year. The following section provides an analysis of the three (3) loans secured from the IMF and World Bank to fight the pandemic and fund economic recovery. Government secures a $300 million budget support loan from World Bank In June 2020, Uganda secured a $300 million budget support loan from World Bank. The loan aimed to boost government’s capacity to prevent, detect and treat the coronavirus, protect the poor and vulnerable population, and support economic recovery. This loan came with a grace period of 6 years, a repayment duration (maturity) of 38 15 years, and no interest. The World Bank highlighted that the loan funds were nonearmarked general budget support that remained subject to government’s own implementation processes and systems. The Bank also stated that the funding program was aligned to the country’s long-term development aspirations as stipulated within the National Development Plan (II and III). In respect of the funding, government agreed on a number of policy and institutional reforms within a reform program that the World Bank refers to as a “development policy operation.” According to the World Bank, reforms were focused on improving the business environment to support productivity improvements, growth and job creation on a more sustainable basis. Government was to pay stronger attention to better management of state-owned enterprises and payment of domestic arears to suppliers. It was also agreed within the lending operation that deeper reforms were needed to improve effectiveness in the utilization of state resources, by managing public investments more efficiently, mobilizing domestic revenues more efficiently, curbing corruption, and empowering the private sector to become more competitive to generate better and higher productivity jobs for Ugandans. Furthermore, better debt management remained a key aspect of Research on the Influence of International Financial Institutions on Uganda’s COVID – 19 Recovery Agenda