First Deputy Director of International Monetary Fund (IMF) David Lipton said this week in Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, that in 2012, despite the stagnation in global economy, the economy of sub-Saharan Africa powerfully developed. It is assumed that this trend will continue in the current and future years.
According to Lipton, last year the economic growth of Sub-Saharan Africa accounted for 5.1 percent. The IMF predicts that the rate in 2014 will reach 5.7 percent. In addition, in the current year the growth of the global economy, presumably, would be only 3.3 percent, and in 2014 it can reach 4 percent.
Lipton noted that Mozambique, which is the representative of South African region, in 2012 showed 7.4 percent economic growth. Mozambique has successfully neutralized the negative impact of the world’s recession in different areas by strengthening trade and economic ties with countries with emerging markets, which was evidence of the effectiveness of economic policy.
In 1992 in Mozambique ended a civil war that lasted 16 years. The political and economic situation in the country is gradually stabilizing.
Big oil & gas offshore and coal resources of the country, which were discovered a few years ago, attract foreign investors but because of the underdeveloped economy a half of Mozambique's population lives below the poverty line.
Lipton said that Mozambique is the epitome of the whole of Africa, despite the fact that this country still faces many serious challenges. However, in the past 20 years there have been made dramatic changes in different fields of economics.
Prospects of Mozambique and its economic development attracted worldwide attention, noted IMF official.
However, World Bank economists note that high inequality and a big dependence on mineral exports and mining in many countries of the region had actually dampened the poverty-reducing effect of income growth. The states rich in natural resources, such as Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and Nigeria, performed less well than those lacking this apparent head start.
