By CLAVER MUTINTA –
A BUSINESS-oriented and skills development international organisation says Zambia is among 20 countries in Africa whose gross domestic product (GDP) is growing at a fast rate and it is anticipated to continue for the next 13 years.
Africa Management Services Company (AMSCO) chief executive officer and managing director, Paul Malherbe said the current GDP for Zambia and other countries in Africa is five per cent and above.
Speaking during the AMSCO conference in Lusaka, Mr Malherbe said apart from the GDP growth, Zambia and other countries are also witnessing rapid growth in job opportunities.
“The bottom line is that Africa is growing and Africa is a region that is growing faster than anyone…  We are right in the middle of the continent that is fast growing in terms of the economies, fastest growing in terms of job opportunities,” he said.
He said if the continent was to continue with economic growth for the next 30 years, it should address constraints such as financial capital and human capital.
Meanwhile, Mr Malherbe says the foreign direct investment (FDI) that has been coming to Africa from 2014 to 2015 was around US$284 billion, while $548 billion was lost due to fraud and underhand transactions.
“Foreign direct investment into Africa from 2014 and 2015 was in the vicinity of $284 billion, it is a huge amount of money that the rest of the world has put into our contact. The GDP lost due to poor governance, fraud, underhand transactions and all those things that are unsound is $548 billion,” he said.
Mr Malherbe cautioned that Africans should desist from abusing resources if they want to attract any FDIs.
“We believe that these constraints will all be eradicated if you have well run business, well governed countries and through participation in economic activities at all levels of the economy. We need to have the private sector involved, governments involved, development agencies involved, otherwise we will never solve these problems,” he said.
National coordinator for private sector development, industrialisation and job creation at Cabinet Office Mushuma Mulenga said Zambia and many other African countries experienced impressive rates of growth but lacked job creation.
Mr Mulenga said the issue of human capital was a key component of Zambian Government’s job creation agenda which, among other things aims at promoting investment in skills development and creating one million decent jobs in the next five years.
Mr Mulenga said Government will create necessary conditions that will allow the private sector to be active participants in its job creation agenda.
“The Government has also recognised that one of the key success factors to achieve the job creation agenda will be the active participation of the private sector. The active participation of the private sector and promotion of private sector in job creation is one of the initiatives that will be key success factors if we had to create one million jobs,” he said.
He called for the scaling up of human capital development in all forms, adding that it was important for Zambia to be globally competitive.
Stanbic Bank head of human capital Eve Nkumbula urged human resources practitioners to acquaint themselves with how their organisations make profits so that they would be able to make informed decisions on recruitment.
Ms Nkumbula said most human resources practitioners were not respected, because of the lack of competence on matters concerning company businesses. – Story courtesy of SUMA Systems