The author is economics professor at Kozminski University in Warsaw and a former finance minister of Poland
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine takes its toll. Most tragic are the terrible loss of life and human suffering, but the material destruction too is enormous. Before the war, the IMF forecast an increase this year in Ukraine’s gross domestic product of as much as 3.6 per cent. Now the Economist Intelligence Unit assumes that it will drop in real terms by an alarming 46.5 per cent.
According to Ukrainian prime minister Denys Shmyhal, taking into account the damage already done and the expected fall in production in coming years, the losses will exceed $1tn, of which the destruction of infrastructure amounts to $120bn.