Since the installation of the Colombian Government over a year ago, significant policy strides have been made. The Government has demonstrated a proactive commitment to advancing Total Peace efforts by fostering dialogues and ceasefires with some non-state armed groups.

However, Colombia continues to face important structural challenges. First, the rate of potential growth is insufficient to secure a convergence in income per capita to high-income countries.

Second, Colombia remains one of the most unequal countries in the world. Economic growth alone has not been sufficient to reduce inequality, as barriers to economic opportunities persist for certain groups (including by gender, ethnicity, and geography), limiting socioeconomic mobility.

Source: World Bank, 2023

What are the development challenges in Colombia?:

Colombia’s considerable reliance on oil revenues, relatively high poverty and inequality levels, high exposure to natural disaster risk, and a relatively complex political economy represent major challenges to making the Government’s fiscal framework sustainable. At the same time, sustaining growth in the longer run needs smart investments in infrastructure, health, and education without risking fiscal and debt sustainability.

Colombia faces significant social and geographic inequalities, including in human capital. To tackle poverty and stimulate prosperity more equally across all regions, it is crucial to foster more efficient and inclusive labor markets, reform the social security system andthe intergovernmental fiscal transfer system, and strengthen subnational government capacity to ensure widespread access to quality public services.