Zambia plans to boost its exports to the Democratic Republic of Congo to more than $2 billion this year from $1.2 billion in 2009, taking advantage of the flexible trade terms, Trade Minister Felix Mutati said on Thursday.
Mutati said exports to the DRC, Zambia’s largest trading partner in the African trading bloc COMESA, had continued to increase because there were no restrictions on goods it could export to its neighbour.
“The advantage of the DR Congo is that the range of exports is from agricultural products through to processed items, machinery and literally anything we can produce in Zambia,” Mutati said at a media briefing.
“All those complicated things which make it difficult to trade, particularly with Europe, do not apply with our neighbours and you could literally take live chickens across borders and they will buy,” Mutati said.
Mutati said Zambia had started building a one-stop border at Kasumbalesa on the border with DRC to facilitate trade and speed up clearance procedures.
[pullquote]”All those complicated things which make it difficult to trade, particularly with Europe, do not apply with our neighbours and you could literally take live chickens across borders and they will buy,” Mutati said.[/pullquote]
“We expect the buildings and related infrastructure to be completed by the end of this year because our colleagues in the DRC have already completed their structures,” he said.
A report by the Infrastructure Consortium for Africa in November showed service costs were high in sub-Saharan Africa due to poor roads, water and power networks and the region needed to double its infrastructure spending to $93 billion a year to effect improvements.
[REUTERS]
DR Congo is on the rise. They are investing in infrastructure like they’ve just gotten idenpendence. Mind you they’ve done 50 years already and they are just coming out(if not still in) war. While we in Zambia, all we do is complain …no ba chitechi has stolen and is in court..bamudala has travelled and so fourth..Watch out for Congo DR they are on the move..They don’t care about ignorant peoples rants.
#1 China Stop hallucinating. Congo DRC is still in dire straits. The Congolese economy has not picked up. Their major export just like Zambia is copper. To date Zambia is Africa’s largest copper producer. Zambia produced 697 000 tonnes in 2009. Congo DRC produced 380 000 tonnes. Zambia with a population of 13m has a GDP of $12.44bn . Your favourite country of DRC has a population of 62m with a paltry GDP of $7bn. Zambia and South Africa are the only two countries in Africa which are self sufficient in grain production i.e Wheat and Maize. Zambia my dear is in a far better economic position than the DRC.
Koma ba Princess zoana!! did you read the article? or you just got the subject? read the article first and and then my comment and understand them, then we can talk. I never meant that Congo DR is better than Zambia interms of Economy or GDP. For your simple understanding, I meant that Congo DR’s Economy is growing and it may pass our very own in Zambia because of people like you.
Ok ba princess: you want to big Zed u with your facts. But the impetus here, in terms of development is with DRC. They are moving really fast under the young man Kabila (as opposed t0 our thick President who likes marching in front of foreign troops!). China is gonna build 4 new state of the art universities in DRC cngo in exchange for all mineral rights in DRC. China is also building a dozen Hospitals in DRC too as part of the same agreement. Zambia may produce the copper, but the privatization model adopted by the thick MMD will not favour any zambians but the chinese. Indians, Canadians (you name it!). DRC is slowly renegotiating all these things and gaining revenue from them. DRC will be the new SA in 10 years time and Zambia – where?
Koumboka you understand issues and I’m glad that you are following the developments in the Southern Africa. Kabila is in for business, he wants to develop his country…he cares not about these your facts madam or mr princess of GDP’s or Economic boast like you show off in zambia with figures and percentages which local Zambians in Chama and Mwense don’t see.
DRC will never overtake South Africa nor Zambia in the next 10 or 20 years.
It is a poor lawless country. It is a failed state. Period. You can call me names but that wont change the facts on the ground.
China are facts and figures an inconvienience to you? How will you tell that DRC has caught up with South Africa without knowing their respective GDPs? I dont give a damn if your relatives do not know what GDP stands for. At least I expected you to know that you can only calculate the growth or non growth of an economy on the basis of the total amount of goods and services produced in a country. That is why I gave you those GDP figures. In 2010 Zambia is expected to grow by 5.8% of the $12.44 bn while Congo DRC will add 3.5% to its $7bn GDP figure. These are official projections. It is easy to see which economy is growing at a faster rate. Certainly DRC is not the tiger you are claiming it to be. There is hunger in the Congo!
Prince mwa lasa ba kamba. i like your partriotism
Princess, GDP figures work well in a closed economy. Here you assume everything produced by the firms were sold to the households. By the same token, all the incomes spent on the finished goods in the product market was earned in the resource market by the households.
Neither situation is true for Zambia. Zambia hardly produces anything. We import almost everything.
The monies spent on goods is mostly stolen from donor contributions. In the income formula, C, G, and -Xn are the largest components. Ig is nothing to write home about.
With this contusion, how do you measure rGDP?
Even if we lied to ourselves for a moment that we can compute GDP, the per cap GDP would not work as 62% of the population nonproductive.
How about we nkashi?
#9 Na Mayo
Sometimes its better to humble yourself. I am at a loss to understand why you would venture to comment on something that is evidently beyond your station and mental capacity. What medication are you on man? Are you sure Zambia does not produce anything? What exactly do you mean by GDP figures work well in a closed economy? What sort of nonsense is this? Next time use English because I do not understand Antarctican!
#9 Na Mayo you can not say that people working in the informal sector are not productive. They are an integral part of the economy.
Fack that!!! A full went to MUVI TV and said Zed students in Russia were given baggage allowances and they used it to marry, why the stupedety from GOvernment? They want to concentrate on rigging election. GIVE US THE BAGGAGE ALLOWANCES YOU MORONS