AGRICULTURE CONTRIBUTION TO GDP SINKS TO 27.1% – News from Malawi

National Account figures from the Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) have shown that Agriculture’s contribution to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is expected to shrink by 0.2 percentage points in 2019 from 27.3% to 27.1%.

The report says that in the past nine years, show that agriculture’s contribution to the GDP has been slowly declining  from 30 percent in 2010 to 27.1% this year.

Malawi Confederation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry (MCCCI) President, Prince Kapondamgaga, addressed issues of low production in agriculture, saying that low productivity means very little left for commercial purposes after domestic consumption.

Despite the shrink, the statistics indicate that agriculture still remains, by far, Malawi’s biggest contributor to the GDP. On the other hand, Malawi’s debt to GDP ratio has more than doubled since 2011, seen at slightly higher than 60% in the last financial year. In its July Monthly Economic Report, Investment management and advisory firm, Nico Asset Managers, says that the government thus faces increasing exposure to high domestic debt.