* El Salvador’s finance minister,
Alejandro Zelaya, has revealed that five months of reduced economic activity due to the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic have cost the country some US$700m in lost tax revenue. Zelaya warned that this could rise to US$928m by the end of the year, due to the continued impact of the pandemic, as well as two tropical storms, 'Amanda' and 'Cristóbal', which struck in May and June. The minister added that this loss in revenue “
will have to be recovered through a greater fight against tax evasion and other revenue strategies”, and highlighted the impact of the government’s anti-evasion plan, which he said generated US$115m between January and July. The latest (July 2020) report from the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (Eclac) forecasts that El Salvador’s GDP will shrink by 8.6% in 2020 due to the impact of the pandemic - the largest contraction in Central America.
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