OREANDA-NEWS. March 16, 2012. Belarus’ money-crediting policy in 2012 will be focused to restraining inflation growth that it does not exceed 19-22%, Sergei Dubkov, Deputy Chairman of the NBB Board, said in a speech at the second international forum “Capital Market of Belarus. Challenges and Opportunities” in Minsk on Thursday.

“To achieve macroeconomic stability and sustain economic growth, Belarus needs to ensure price stability. For that reason Belarus’ money-crediting policy in 2012 will be focused on reducing inflation growth to 19-22% by means of monetary instruments and with the government’s economic policy,” Dubkov said.

Furthermore, the National Bank’s interest rate policy in 2012 will be aimed at securing a positive level of the real interest rates, Dubkov said.

“At the same time, one should make allowance for the existing expectations of high inflation growth and devaluation, as well as certain risks in the external sector,” the banker said. “For that reason, one should not expect nominal interest rates to go down fast for the sake of increasing the volume of lending in the real economy sector”, Dubkov said. As previously reported, the National Bank cut the refinancing rate by 2 percentage points down to 43% per annum on February 15, 2012. All in all, Belarus would raise the refinancing rate twelve times in 2011.