Business captains and trade experts met in Lilongwe Wednesday to bang heads on how best Malawi could craft an effective export strategy which could help the country to realise her economic transformation aspirations, following the National Export Strategy (Nes).

The stakeholders reflected on the passed Nes and learnt that its failure was no surprise. During the meeting, Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Tourism, Ken Ndala, said attributed the failure to low level of investment in productive sectors both in terms of FDI and local investment in manufacturing projects with high value addition, among others.

As a new National Export Strategy has been outlined, it was addressed that there was need to scrutinize specific laws and regulations, government institutions and many more.

The new strategy which will run from 2019-2022 is thought to have been planned, learning from the prior strategy. The new strategy will therefore correct the mistakes from the last strategy, while providing solutions for constraints faced by the last strategy.