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Tanzania's economy strong enough to meet growth target: official

Xinhua, September 15, 2016 Adjust font size:

The Bank of Tanzania (BoT) said Wednesday that the country's economy is strong enough to sustain a 7.2 percent growth on the back of stable electricity production and a growing construction industry.

BoT governor Benno Ndulu said sectors such as agriculture, trade, transport, finance and telecommunications are also growing at an impressive pace.

Tanzania targets a 7.2-percent annual economic growth for 2016. Its economy slowed down to 5.5 percent in the first quarter of 2016 compared with 5.7 percent in the same period last year.

Addressing a news conference in the commercial capital Dar es Salaam, Ndulu denied recent reports that Tanzania's economy, the second largest in east Africa, is shrinking due to various policies adopted by the new administration of President John Magufuli.

"Economic activities have tremendously increased in the first quarter of 2016 with the financial sector improved on 13.5 percent, telecommunication on 13.4 percent and public administration on 10.2 percent," said the governor.

"When looking at economic growth indicators, the economy will continue to be stable throughout the year, because electricity production from January to June has increased on 14.5 percent to 3,454.2 kWh compared to 3,016.7 kWh recorded the same period in 2015," he said.

Ndulu said the improvement on electricity productions came after the government's efforts to start using gas for electricity production.

He said the country's import of raw materials for manufacturing industries has increased by 19.4 percent in first half of the year which recorded at 520 million U.S. dollars compared to the same period in 2015.

Exports of industrial products from January to June 2016 also continued to grow at a balanced speed, he said.

According to him, the sales of the export products reached to 728.5 million U.S. dollars in the first half of the year, which increased from almost 628 million U.S. dollars in the same period in 2015.

He added that tax collection also improved in H1, an indication of good economic growth of the country".

Ndulu said the Tanzanian shilling remained relatively stable in the first half of 2016, following implementation of various monetary policies in managing the liquidity situation in the economy. Endit