Zambia recorded the lowest growth rate in April with Gross Domestic Product at 3.55% in April from 3.75% in March 2019.
Bloomberg tracks country GDP and recently harvested data off their terminal indicates that the economic forecast on an annual year on year basis shows that the country’s GDP growth rate has been revised downwards from 4.8% in August 2018 to the current rate of 3.55%.
Zambia’s GDP is forecast to reach 3.9% and 3.8% in 2019 and 2020 respectively, according to ‘The World Economic Situation and Prospects 2019’ published by a joint product of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN/DESA), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the five United Nations regional commissions (Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), Economic Commission for Europe (ECE), Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) and Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA)). Furthermore, one of the critical factors has an impact on GDP, inflation, is projected at 7.1 and 6.8 for the same period. This is within the target rate specified by the Bank of Zambia at the February 2019 Monetary Policy announcement.
As at August 2018, Bloomberg’s GDP forecast stood at 4.8 growth rate. However, this has been revised downwards by as much as 26.04% since then.
Since 2000, the labour market which is one of the drivers of GDP has seen a notable shift in the contribution of sectors such as agriculture, industry and services. From 2000, agriculture has moved from contributing approximately 70% to 50%. Industry has experienced a marginal increase of about 5% to 10% with the bulk of contribution come from the services sector, according the UN joint report.
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the broadest quantitative measure of a nation’s total economic activity. More specifically, GDP represents the monetary value of all goods and services produced within a nation’s geographic borders over a specified period of time. By definition, the equation for calculating GDP is: GDP = private consumption + gross investment + government investment + government spending + (exports – imports). For the gross domestic product, “gross” means that the GDP measures production regardless of the various uses to which the product can be put.