Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust—Guidance Note on the Strengthened Policy Safeguards

In October 2024, as part of the Review of the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) Facilities and Financing, the IMF Executive Board established the “Strengthened Policy Safeguards (SPS)”—combining and replacing the previous High Access Procedures (HAP) and Enhanced Safeguards for debt sustainability and capacity to repay (ES)—thereby streamlining a key part of the safeguards framework for Fund lending. The SPS operates alongside the exceptional access framework and the Policy Safeguards for High Combined Credit (PS-HCC). The SPS framework applies when proposed access under a new arrangement, the Rapid Credit Facility (RCF), or an augmentation of access under an arrangement in the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (PRGT) exceeds certain access thresholds, and when countries at high risk of, or in, overall debt distress request financing. This note provides guidance on how to implement the SPS. It supersedes the 2022 guidance note on enhanced safeguards.