Friday Feb 20, 2026
Friday Feb 20, 2026
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| Talal Rafi |
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has awarded economist Talal Rafi for the Most Popular Public Finance Article of 2025 for its Public Financial Management (PFM) Blog, recognising the global reach, policy relevance, and impact of his contribution to the IMF’s Public Financial Management (PFM) discourse.
Published on the IMF’s PFM Forum, Rafi’s article stood out among contributions from policymakers, practitioners, and scholars worldwide which includes IMF staff and PFM experts globally. Talal’s article “What Measures Can Developing Countries Take to Curb Rising Debt Levels” was recognised as the most popular article published by IMF PFM Blog for 2025. The article highlighted the current debt situation in developing countries and included recommendations which include debt restructuring, increasing progressive taxation, increasing government efficiency and strategising economic growth.
Talal Rafi is a Sri Lanka based economist. He is an expert columnist to the International Monetary Fund on public finance and a member of the expert network of the World Economic Forum. He also holds appointments as a Consultant to the European Commission and a Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Poverty Analysis. His past experience includes being a consultant to the Asian Development Bank, a Director at Ernst & Young Sri Lanka, a member of the Deloitte Global Economist Network and having served on the Board of Sri Lanka’s government foreign policy think tank. His work has been published by the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Asian Development Bank, World Economic Forum, Johns Hopkins University, and the London School of Economics.
