The government announced the Grow Zambia Agenda, […]

The government announced the Grow Zambia Agenda, a national economic transformation agenda aiming to shift macroeconomic stabilization to increased production, job creation, and economic expansion through 2031.

Some experts in the financial sector have indicated that to achieve the Grow Zambia Agenda, the government needs to ensure that various economic indicators remain stable and ensure that the growth is driven by small and medium enterprises (SMEs).

 Economic expert Trevor Hambayi has noted that achieving the Grow Zambia Agenda is not necessarily dependent on economic metrics but rather depends on economic strategies that will be established around driving the economic agenda.

 Speaking in an interview with Zambian Business Times-ZBT Hambayi, it was noted that provided that the economic fundamentals are important stabilized as it will make it easy to achieve growth across various sectors.

“If the fundamentals don’t remain stable, it will be very difficult to be able to deal with growth, because growth is based on the predictability of economic fundamentals such as inflation and exchange rate,” said Hambayi.

 He noted that achieving the agenda should be a collaborative effort that should involve the public sector, citizens, and government.

 “There are three matrices that are speaking to who is driving the economic agenda, which specifically states that it’s a combination of government, citizens, and the public sector, which must all come together in achieving the desired growth,” said Hambayi.

He stated that the public sector needs to join in the agenda by creating an enabling environment through having access to capital with reduced interests to ensure that the private sector can access capital to be able to invest in the economy for the growth agenda,” said Hambayi.

 He further noted that making sure that the growth agenda should make it possible for local enterprises, especially domestic investments, which are SMEs, to be part of economic growth.

“In order to achieve the desired economic growth as a country, we have to ensure that local enterprises or domestic investors, which are SMEs, are part of the investment in the Grow Zambia Agenda, as that will help in making sure that ordinary Zambians are able to benefit from the growth once attained,” said Hambayi.

Article by Justine Phiri