Mining & Trade News

President Chakwera has said that a vibrant private sector is crucial in stimulating the country’s economic growth and creating employment.

Speaking during launch of the Presidential Initiative on Job Creation, drawn to address youth unemployment and private sector productivity, Chakwera explained that the rise in the cost of living being experienced in the country is a result of a shift in economic prospects due to global dynamics and the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.

In 2020, the COVID–19 out-break, which mainly affected activities in tourism, the accommodation and food subsectors, transportation and agriculture, saw Malawi’s economic growth drop from 5.7 percent in 2019 to 1.7percent.  

Real GDP growth, expected to be driven by recoveries in the tourism and agriculture sectors, exports, FDI, and public investments in infrastructure (airport, roads, energy), is projected to grow at 3.3 percent in 2021 and 6.2 percent in 2022 despite threats of disruption from a potential COVID–19 third wave, bad weather, and fiscal overruns due to revenue underperformance.

To kick-start the initiative, Chakwera announced the partnership between the National Economic Empowerment Fund (NEEF) and mobile phone service provider TNM. The partnership intends to drive mobile phone penetration, financial inclusion, job creation and community development under the Presidential Initiative on Job Creation.

The president further said government has put in place measures that will generate an enabling environment for agro-business; stronger partnership with the private sector; solutions to tackling the barriers to small and medium enterprises; capacity to build the infrastructure needed to support jobs and supporting the youth to participate in the economy.

“Removing those obstacles is government’s responsibility and it begins here with my declaration that my administration will engage the private sector as partners,” he said while admitting that his government had failed to create one million jobs in the first year of his administration, as promised during the presidential election campaign.

He attributed the failure to the Covid-19 pandemic, which he claimed had reversed the gains made by his government and had cost the country 600 000 jobs from the time the first COVID-9 cases were reported in April 2020.

In a Hardtalk interview with British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Chakwera claimed his administration had covered up the loss with labour engagements in the Affordable (farm) Inputs Programme (AIP) and in NEEF, which he said had facilitated the creation of thousands of new businesses through the disbursement of business loans.

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