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(TIMES ZM) Chikwanda defines job creation plan

Chikwanda defines job creation plan
May 23, 2012
By Business Reporter -

THE Government has come up with measures to trigger job creation because the positive economic gains Zambia has been posting will remain meaningless if they do not help in reducing the current unemployment rate.

Finance and National Planning Minister Alexander Chikwanda said yesterday the positive macro-economic indicators Zambia was registering should ultimately translate into more jobs for the youth.

Mr Chikwanda said the Government would champion policies which promote the growth of sectors in which Zambia had comparative advantage like agriculture, tourism, construction and manufacturing.

The Government would increase investments in the infrastructure sector to address the constraints to higher economic growth.

“Ultimately, growth is a function of labour, capital and total factor productivity,” he said.

Mr Chikwanda said keeping the sensitive age group unemployed was like sitting on a time bomb, adding that the unemployment among the youths had potential to cause social unrest.

He said the Government was committed to creating the one million new jobs that Zambia needs in the next five years.

“My ministry will support policies that will grow sectors that have a comparative advantage and have the greatest potential to create gainful employment. We shall increase infrastructure investment to address the constraints to growth,” he said.

The minister said it is his ministry’s role to increase productivity of capital and labour through policy and institutional reforms that promote a more efficient and accountable public and private sector.

He said it was unfortunate that while Zambia’s population had increased by 330 per cent since independence, formal sector employment had just increase by 75 per cent in the same period and that only 700,000 people were in the formal sector out of the six-million labour force.

He said to create jobs, the economic growth rates being posted like 7.7 for 2012 were not enough and the Government would next year grow the economy by 8.3 which was above the Sub-Saharan Africa rate of 5.3 per cent.

And the International Monetary Fund said it was important that mineral wealth in Zambia would help diversify the economy so that dependence on mining was reduced.

Labels: ALEXANDER CHIKWANDA, JOBS, UNEMPLOYMENT

posted by MrK @ 2:44 AM