If Russia stopped supplying natural gas to the European Union, it would certainly have negative effects on it. The International Monetary Fund attempted to gauge how serious a problem this would be for the EU economy.
The end of Russian gas
If all Russian gas stops flowing into the European Union in July and months beyond, its economy will contract by half to three percent. It follows from an estimate by the International Monetary Fund. But the IMF is working with two scenarios where, in a more optimistic way, the EU would remain stocked with gas from alternative suppliers and proceed together in procurement of the commodity. A more pessimistic option would occur when the European gas market fragmented.
Which countries take away the end of Russian gas the most?
The worst would be the impacts on the countries that depend most on Russian gas. That is, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Hungary’s economy would shrink by about 6.5 percent at worst, Slovakia by just under 6 and the Czech Republic by about 5.5 percent. The economies of Sweden and Denmark would see the smallest contraction, within half a percent.
