Zambia sees steady growth and smaller budget deficit next year - TimesLIVE

Zambia will aim to keep economic growth around 5% in 2027 while halving the budget deficit, which swelled this year on fuel tax cuts and higher-than-projected spending, its finance minister said on Friday.

The government will aim to reduce the fiscal deficit to not more than 3.0% of GDP from 5.9% this year, finance minister Situmbeko Musokotwane said in his budget speech.

This year’s deficit ballooned because of fuel tax cuts to cushion the impact of the Iran war on households and businesses, as well as spending on maize purchases for the country’s food reserves.

Economic growth in 2026 was projected at 5.3% last month.

Zambia emerged from a prolonged debt crisis after becoming Africa’s first Covid-19-era sovereign default in 2020.

In October it secured staff-level backing from the International Monetary Fund for a new $1.5bn (R24.81bn) programme.

Musokotwane said Zambia’s copper output was projected at 930,000 tonnes this year, up from about 890,000 tonnes in 2025, and that there would be a stable and predictable fiscal regime for mining companies.

Zambia aims to more than triple copper output to 3-million tonnes by 2031.