Public sector debt ratios have increased in Africa over the past decade.
Public debt has increased from an average of 40% of GDP in 2010 to near 70% of GDP currently. GDP growth has remained below the nominal growth of the public debt stock.
The increase in debt has been accompanied by significant changes in its composition and the nature of the creditors.
The majority of African countries' public debt is now mainly domestic debt, notwithstanding with significant disparities depending on the level of development of local financial markets). Africa's external creditor landscape has diversified. The appeal to new private creditors - notably China - and the use of bond market issues have taken precedence over traditional multilateral and bilateral creditors. Sovereign hard-currency bonds (i.e. Eurobonds) now account for an average of almost 10% of total external public debt, compared with 2.6% in 2010.