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Zambia’s inflation declined to 9.8% in August 2022 from 9.9% the previous month as the central African nation continues to buck the trend of rising inflation across African countries.
This performance is supported by decreasing food prices that generally decreased to 11.3% from the 12% rate in July 2022. Non-food inflation was however found to increase from 7.2% to 7.8%.
According to the country’s statistics agency, the Zambia Central Bank Monetary Policy Committee maintained its benchmark lending rate at 9% for the third straight meeting.
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The committee has projected that inflation will average 11.4% in 2022, and eventually drop to single digits in 2023 as it expects the rate to go back within a target range of 6% and 8% by 2024.
In the last 12-month period, we can see that inflation in Zambia dropped by 12 percentage points maintaining that trend throughout, albeit in July 2022 when it rose for the first time in that period.
African countries continue to reel from the economic effects of COVID-19 and a war between Russia and Ukraine that has affected the transportation of commodities leading to rising prices.
Zambian President, Hakainde Hichilema, who came to power in 2021, recently took to Twitter to remind people of the impact of his leadership.
The Kwacha was reaching K24 against US$1. We've brought it down to stability.
Inflation was 24.5%. Where is it now? Single-digit. is that a success or not? #ChangeIsHere
— Hakainde Hichilema (@HHichilema) August 19, 2022
The Zambian Kwacha is currently trading at K16 to the dollar, based on the latest data.
The dollar had continued to get stronger in Zambia over the last 5 years, peaking in July 2021, when it was about 22 Kwacha to the dollar.
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