. Chikwanda
By HAMATAN KACHABE –
ZAMBIA’S Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for 2016 was more than US$60 billion dollars, as opposed to the $27 billion published the International Monetary Fund (IMF), former Finance minister Alexander Chikwanda has said.
Mr Chikwanda said yesterday that there were so many economic activities happening in Zambia’s informal sector which were not included in the IMF official calculation of Zambia’s GDP for 2016.
The former Finance minister was speaking during the Patriotic Front (PF) Interactive Forum in Lusaka yesterday.
“When you walk around Lusaka, you get amazed at the property that falls under the informal sector, which is normally ignored in the calculation of GDP,” Mr Chikwanda said.
Mr Chikwanda also called on all Zambians to continue working extra hard as this was the only way meaningful development could be achieved.
He said with a largely youthful population of 0-45 years making up 90 per cent of the population, human resource was not a problem for Zambia.
MrChikwanda also warned Zambians that they should not personalize the proposed2018 budget to the extent of labelling it the‘Mutati budget’.
He explained that any budget in Zambia was a document of the Government with the Finance minister’s major role one of explaining how the Government intended to raise and spend money in that coming year.
