Economy · External debt · Chad
Chad’s external debt rose to $3.3bn in 2024.
$3.3bn
2024
Up $0.16bn from 2023.
Updated 8 Oct 2026
In plain words
$3.3bn
What it is. External debt is the total stock of what a country owes to creditors outside its borders, valued in current US dollars. It adds up public borrowing, borrowing guaranteed by the state and private debt owed abroad, so it covers loans from other governments, multilateral lenders and commercial creditors. Because the stock is converted to dollars, exchange rate movements change the figure even when no new loan is signed. The measure gives the size of the obligation and says nothing about the interest rate, the repayment schedule or the country's capacity to pay.
Lower is better. A smaller external debt stock means less income has to go abroad in repayments and less exposure to a rise in the dollar or in global interest rates, so lower is better. Chad's stock stood at $3.3bn in 2024, up from $3.2bn a year earlier, a rise of 4.9%. Since 2015 the range has run from a low of $2.8bn in 2015 to a high of $3.6bn in 2021. The latest figure therefore sits in the upper half of that range, below the 2021 peak.
Why it matters. For Chad, a debt stock of $3.3bn means a share of government revenue and foreign currency earnings, much of it from oil, goes to servicing creditors abroad instead of paying for schools, health care and roads. A stock that is edging up again leaves less room to borrow on easy terms. Firms and households feel this indirectly, through the state's ability to pay suppliers and fund public services.
| Period | External debt · Chad |
|---|---|
| 2015 | $2.8bn |
| 2016 | $2.9bn |
| 2017 | $3.1bn |
| 2018 | $3.2bn |
| 2019 | $3.2bn |
| 2020 | $3.5bn |
| 2021 | $3.6bn |
| 2022 | $3.3bn |
| 2023 | $3.2bn |
| 2024 | $3.3bn |
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0) · Licence: CC BY 4.0
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Strata-AF™ Data, External debt, Chad, 2024; source World Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0), retrieved 8 Oct 2026; https://data.strata-af.com/economy/external-debt/chad
Data insights · Worked out from the published figures
What this means
Working this out from the published figures…
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Methodology
Total external debt stocks, current US dollars (International Debt Statistics). Unit: USD bn.
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators (series DT.DOD.DECT.CD), retrieved through the World Bank API and published under CC BY 4.0. Updated annually; the World Bank's own source notes apply.