In 1997, The Participants to the Arrangement on Officially Supported Export Credits, established a methodology for assessing country credit risk and classifying countries in connection with their agreement on minimum premium fees for official export credits. They are produced solely for the purpose of setting minimum premium rates for transactions supported according to the Arrangement.
The country risk classifications are meant to reflect country risk. Under the Participants’ system, country risk encompasses transfer and convertibility risk (i.e. the risk a government imposes capital or exchange controls that prevent an entity from converting local currency into foreign currency and/or transferring funds to creditors located outside the country) and cases of force majeure (e.g. war, expropriation, revolution, civil disturbance, floods, earthquakes).
According to the rules of the Arrangement, two groups of countries are not classified. The first group is not classified for administrative purposes and is comprised of very small countries that do not generally receive official export credit support. For such countries, Participants are free to apply the country risk classification which they deem appropriate.
The second group of countries is comprised of High Income OECD countries and other High Income Euro-zone countries. Transactions involving obligors in these countries (and any countries classified in Category 0) are subject to the market pricing disciplines set out in Article 24c) and Annex X of the Arrangement.
All other countries (and a limited number of supranational multilateral/regional financial institutions) are classified into one of eight categories (0-7).