Countries by Multilateral debt service (% of public and publicly guaranteed debt service)

Afghanistan and Yemen both rank 1st with 100% of public and publicly guaranteed debt service directed to multilateral creditors, meaning every dollar of their tracked external debt service flows to institutions such as the World Bank and regional development banks. At the other extreme, the Syrian Arab Republic ranks 121st at 0%, and Russia ranks 120th at just 0.016%. The 100-percentage-point gap across the ranking reflects the wide variation in how countries structure their public external borrowing.

Development category

Ranking 2024

Values shown in %.

Countries by Multilateral debt service (% of public and publicly guaranteed debt service)
Rank	Country	%
1	Afghanistan	100.00
1	Yemen	100.00
3	Lebanon	99.97
4	Botswana	99.01
5	Moldova	95.16
6	Timor-Leste	93.70
7	Liberia	91.75
8	Nicaragua	89.41
9	Kosovo	83.53
10	Ukraine	83.26
11	Sao Tome and Principe	82.32
12	Nepal	80.37
13	Bosnia and Herzegovina	78.41
14	Solomon Islands	77.98
15	Burkina Faso	77.19
16	Algeria	75.81
17	Zimbabwe	75.03
18	Madagascar	74.65
19	Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	72.33
20	Sierra Leone	71.40
21	Bolivia	71.30
22	Malawi	70.99
23	Fiji	70.16
24	Gambia	69.51
25	Georgia	68.73
26	Burundi	68.46
27	Suriname	68.15
28	Lesotho	67.14
29	Niger	66.99
30	Eswatini	64.93
31	Albania	64.12
32	Grenada	61.86
33	Mauritania	59.50
34	Mali	59.31
35	Rwanda	59.25
36	Armenia	58.68
37	Central African Republic	58.45
38	Guyana	58.44
39	Paraguay	57.97
40	Honduras	57.71
41	Guatemala	57.55
42	Bangladesh	53.06
43	Belize	52.51
44	Papua New Guinea	51.98
45	Sudan	51.16
46	Cabo Verde	50.85
47	North Macedonia	47.74
48	Djibouti	47.23
49	Guinea-Bissau	47.20
50	Tajikistan	47.17
51	Kyrgyzstan	45.83
52	Ethiopia	45.60
53	Uganda	39.68
54	Morocco	39.26
55	Ecuador	39.16
56	India	39.06
57	Vietnam	38.95
58	Comoros	38.34
59	Jordan	38.33
60	Saint Lucia	38.01
61	Sri Lanka	37.94
62	Samoa	36.96
63	Tunisia	36.57
64	Argentina	35.62
65	Jamaica	35.55
66	Ghana	34.33
67	Uzbekistan	34.07
68	Togo	33.84
69	Philippines	33.22
70	Nigeria	32.54
71	Egypt	32.29
72	Peru	31.62
73	Somalia	30.82
74	Vanuatu	30.70
75	Kazakhstan	30.50
76	Dominica	30.16
77	Bhutan	29.64
78	Cambodia	29.15
79	Pakistan	29.13
80	Tanzania	27.71
81	Senegal	27.59
82	Gabon	27.41
83	DR Congo	27.36
84	Eritrea	27.21
85	Cameroon	26.90
86	Guinea	26.75
87	Zambia	26.37
88	Kenya	25.91
89	Azerbaijan	25.50
90	Dominican Republic	24.58
91	El Salvador	24.46
92	Maldives	24.20
93	Mongolia	23.36
94	Thailand	23.00
95	Benin	21.01
96	Myanmar	19.91
97	Chad	19.06
98	Serbia	18.75
99	Montenegro	18.15
100	Mozambique	18.06
101	Iraq	17.44
102	Laos	16.88
103	Colombia	15.94
104	Turkmenistan	15.61
105	Côte d'Ivoire	15.18
106	Bulgaria	14.89
107	Iran	14.12
108	Tonga	13.89
109	Belarus	13.37
110	Türkiye	13.36
111	Indonesia	12.77
112	Brazil	11.89
113	Republic of Congo	10.64
114	Mexico	10.39
115	South Africa	10.09
116	Mauritius	8.57
117	China	7.54
118	Angola	4.98
119	Haiti	0.81
120	Russia	0.02
121	Syria	0.00

Analysis

This metric measures multilateral debt service as a share of total public and publicly guaranteed debt service, expressed as a percentage, where a higher share indicates greater reliance on multilateral creditors. The World Bank defines it as follows: multilateral debt service is the repayment of principal and interest to the World Bank, regional development banks, and other multilateral agencies; public and publicly guaranteed debt service is the sum of principal repayments and interest actually paid in currency, goods, or services on long-term obligations of public debtors and long-term private obligations guaranteed by a public entity. The indicator code is DT.TDS.MLAT.PG.ZS from the World Bank World Development Indicators. The dataset covers 121 countries, all with data from the last seven years, and 100% of datapoints are classified as official quality. No extreme outliers were identified using a 3-standard-deviation threshold, and average year-over-year change was 37.5%, below the 50% volatility threshold.

The top of the ranking is concentrated among lower-income and conflict-affected economies. Afghanistan and Yemen share the 1st position at 100%, followed by Lebanon at 99.97% (3rd), Botswana at 99.01% (4th), and Moldova at 95.16% (5th). Timor-Leste ranks 6th at 93.70%, Liberia 7th at 91.75%, and Nicaragua 8th at 89.41%. These high shares indicate that nearly all tracked external debt service in these countries is owed to multilateral institutions, with minimal bilateral or commercial debt service recorded in the dataset.

The middle of the ranking includes a diverse group of economies. Bangladesh ranks 42nd at 53.06%, Morocco 54th at 39.26%, and India 56th at 39.06%. Notably, China ranks 117th at just 7.54%, despite being a major borrower and lender globally, reflecting that the bulk of its public debt service flows outside the multilateral channel. Russia at 0.016% (120th) and Syria at 0% (121st) sit at the very bottom. Haiti presents a counterintuitive case, ranking 119th at just 0.81%, a striking contrast given its economic profile relative to top-ranked lower-income peers.

This metric captures only the share of multilateral debt within the public and publicly guaranteed debt service framework and does not account for the absolute volume of debt or total debt burden. Countries with very low multilateral shares may have large commercial or bilateral debt obligations that dominate their debt service, or may have minimal external debt overall. Reporting relies on debtor-country disclosures to the World Bank, and gaps or delays in reporting can affect accuracy. The 2024 data year means some values reflect projections or preliminary figures, and the 98.3% consistency rate for the latest year indicates that two countries have data from prior years rather than 2024 itself.

Methodology

Indicator: DT.TDS.MLAT.PG.ZS. Source: World Bank World Development Indicators. Data year: 2024. Unit: percentage. Higher values indicate a greater share of public and publicly guaranteed debt service directed to multilateral creditors. Per the source definition: multilateral debt service is the repayment of principal and interest to the World Bank, regional development banks, and other multilateral agencies; public and publicly guaranteed debt service is the sum of principal repayments and interest actually paid in currency, goods, or services on long-term obligations of public debtors and long-term private obligations guaranteed by a public entity. The ranking covers 121 countries, all meeting the recency threshold of data within the last seven years. Data quality is 100% official. No extreme outliers were detected at the 3-standard-deviation threshold. Average year-over-year change was 37.5%, within the 50% volatility threshold. The data range spans 0% to 100%. Latest-year consistency is 98.3%, with 119 of 121 countries reporting 2024 values. No microstates are included in the dataset.

Sources

World Bank