Origins The need for an organization like the IMF became evident during the Great Depression that ravaged the world economy in the 1930s. Most of us are familiar with that era through dramatic photographs of farms eroding away in duststorms and of lines of jobless men waiting to enter soup kitchens. The Depression was devastating to all forms of economic life. Banks failed by the thousands, leaving bewildered depositors penniless, agricultural prices fell below the cost of production, land values plummeted, abandoned farms reverted to wilderness, factories stood idle, fleets waited in harbors for cargoes that never materialized, and tens of m