Eastern province has of the month of October 2023 recorded a reduction of about 2.5 percent in inflation to 10.5 percent from 12.8 percent recorded in September 2023.
This has been attributed to reduced smuggling of mealie meal into neighboring countries, and the government’s intervention through the Zambia National Service –ZNS- by distributing cheaper mealie meal.
Eastern Province Deputy Secretary Beauty Phiri explained that the major drivers of inflation in the province were the issues of smuggling mealie and maize into Malawi thereby causing a lot of havoc in the province. She said with government ensuring that mealie meal is just within Eastern Province, and not allowing anyone to take any maize meal, and maize to Malawi, the situation has quite improved. She said all measures have been put in place to ensure that maize, and mealie meal is not exported out of Chipata into the neighboring countries, in addition to the mealie meal prices that have been stabilized which was one of the major factors affecting inflation in the Province.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with the Zambian Business Times –ZBT, Phiri disclosed that there is currently mealie meal that is being brought in by the Zambia National Service ZNS which has helped to cushion and stabilize the prices within the province. “Government has managed to stabilize the prices of mealie meal, so you see that the inflation rate has quite gone down because no one is moving back and forth to go and either access mealie meal, or sell mealie meal at a very high rate so that it advantages their pockets, and not the people” said Phiri.
Phiri reemphasized that Eastern province is bordering on two countries, and the main business is agricultural produce, which is as well taken to the other countries, and other countries bringing in to the province as well. “The fact that we are sitting at the border line of Zambia, the other side of Eastern province, clearly tells us that our main activity is trading, and we trade with these agricultural products that we produce every year” said Phiri.
Phiri disclosed that recently, Eastern province has been a second contributor to the Gross Domestic Product –GDP- when it comes to agricultural products in the country, though it did not do well last year, only producing about 17, 000 metric tons.
She added that the maize produced in the province is the major trading point between Zambia its two neighboring countries on the eastern side. She said this is what brings in most people as it is their core business. She said it is due to the reasons of reduced smuggling, and intervention by government through ZNS that inflation in the province has reduced.
