Zambia is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. It is bordered by Tanzania to the north, Malawi to the east, Mozambique to the southeast, Zimbabwe and Botswana to the south, Angola to the west, and Namibia to the southwest. The capital city of Zambia is Lusaka. The population of Zambia is estimated at 17.4 million people with over 70 different ethnic groups speaking over 50 different languages. The official language is English but many Zambians also speak Bemba or Nyanja as their first language. The economy of Zambia relies heavily on copper mining and agriculture. Despite this, poverty levels remain high with more than half of its population living below the poverty line. In recent years however there has been an improvement in economic growth with investment in infrastructure and education helping to reduce poverty levels and boost economic growth. See countryaah.com for other countries that start with letter Z.
In 2013, the government removed the subsidies for the country’s farmers. The state had previously paid 75% of the price for i.e. artificial fertilizers and these grants now fell away. The extra expense went on to consumers. For example. the price of corn increased 20% during 2013.
Sata died at a London hospital in October 2014. The post was temporarily taken over by White Vice President Guy Scott. It was the first time since the apartheid regime in South Africa that the continent had a white president. According to constitutions, presidential elections were to be conducted within 90 days of Sata’s death. However, Scott was barred from running for election as the Constitution also required both parents to have Zambian citizenship. Still, Scott tried to eliminate his biggest rival when, less than a week after Sata’s death, he fired the Secretary of the Patritic Front, Edgar Lungu. However, he had to reinstate Lungu the day after due to extensive demonstrations in Lusaka.
In January 2015, presidential elections were held. it was narrowly won by Patriotic Front’s Edgar Lungu with 48.3% of the vote, while Hakainde Hichilema of the United Party for National Development (UPND) got 46.7%. Lungu was posted to the post a few days later. He had been Minister of Defense and Minister of Justice in Sata’s government, and had been acting president for long periods during Sata’s illness in 2013-14.
Lungu made Inonge Wina his vice president. It was the first time the country got a female vice president.
In July 2015, President Lungu turned 332 prisoners’ death sentences into life imprisonment. At the same time, he condemned the massive overcrowding of the Mukobeko prison, which he characterized as a “violation of human dignity”.
Electricity shortages led to daily power cuts of up to 14 hours from July. This in turn meant that many businesses and mines had to scale down and fire employees. This in turn affected the economy. During the year, Kwansa lost 80% of its value in terms of US $. 95% of the country’s electricity comes from hydroelectric power stations that have historically supplied both Zambia and Zimbabwe, but global climate change has led to rainfall and therefore the hydroelectric power stations are driving too much power. The rainfall has been reduced to less than half the normal and with the current el Niño an improvement was expected at the earliest in 2018.
In April 2016, a wave of violence targeting foreigners in Zingalume and George Compounds started following rumors of ritual killings. Stores from merchants from Rwanda and Zimbabwe were plundered. Two Zimbabwean citizens were burned to death and the perpetrators were subsequently tried and convicted of murder.
In August 2016, parliamentary and presidential elections were held. Lungu was elected president with 50.35% of the vote against 47.6% for opposition candidate Hakainde Hichilema. Hichilema complained about the election to the Supreme Election Commission and tried to get the result reversed, but after a week the commission rejected the complaint. President Lungus PF went up to 20 seats up to 80, thus obtaining an absolute majority in the 156-seat parliament. Hichilema’s UPND advanced 30 seats to 58. Former President Chiluba’s MMD, in turn, was almost eradicated. It lost 52 seats and had to settle for 3. At the same time as the elections, a referendum on a number of constitutional amendments was carried out. 71.1% voted for the changes, but the voting turnout was only 44.4% and thus below the 50% required for the vote to be valid.
Opposition leader Hakainde Hichilema of the United Party for National Development (UPND) was arrested along with the party’s deputy chairman in October 2016 as they were on their way to visit some of the party members who were sitting in the jail. Hichilema and several other party members were again jailed in April 2017 and charged with treason. Police claimed that Hichilema had not gotten off the road when the presidential car driver drove by.
The regime cracked down on independent media throughout the year. According to thesciencetutor, deveral radio and TV licenses were withdrawn by the state media council.
Economic conditions
Overall, the economic situation of the 1990s appears to be in continuous deterioration. The attempts undertaken to diversify production and to encourage agriculture have so far not achieved the desired results; in the early nineties, these efforts were partly thwarted by a very unfavorable weather trend and by political opposition to land reform projects. An excessively large arable area thus remains, in fact, abandoned due to the backwardness of production systems, the lack of infrastructures and the impossibility of marketing any products in competitive forms. In these conditions, agricultural production destined for local food is insufficient, forcing additional imports (but corn is exported), while a large part of the rural population must focus on subsistence products. Among the plantation crops, destined for the foreign market, only tobacco provides a significant economic contribution. Rather substantial are, however, cattle breeding and residual forest production.
The main item of the economy of the Zambia remains copper, although production has decreased over the years, both due to the lower productivity of the fields (cultivated for many decades now), and to the reduction in the international price of the product, which it has made exploitation less profitable; by reducing the incidence of copper, the trade balance surplus (sometimes in deficit) decreased. The negative trend in copper production is also a consequence of a bankruptcy management of the sector; for this reason it was decided (1997) to separate the large state enterprise that controls it and to privatize it.
Further problems in the economic field arose from international pressures, aimed at obtaining from the government a more open attitude in the political field and compliance with the conditions required by international organizations for the granting of loans, which have been at least partially suspended. Following the changed geopolitical conditions in central and southern Africa (regime change in the Democratic Republic of Congo, easing of guerrilla warfare in Angola, democratization process in South Africa), the future of Zambia is set in a rapidly evolving context and in some promising measures, if processes of real economic integration with neighboring countries are initiated.