Malawi President Bingu wa Mutharika says the country can be rescued from the poverty trap if it ceases to be a consuming nation and becomes a producing and exporting one. To achieve this, the President said his government has designed a Malawi Growth and Development Strategy, which has set out a new development agenda for the country. This he said would mark the beginning of a series of meetings, which aims to map out the way forward for the country’s development.
Chikumbusto Mtumodzi is the Press Secretary to President Bingu wa Mutharika. He said the President has made fighting corruption one of his priorities to stimulate the economy.
“The President Dr. Bingu Wa Mutharika has actually put in place a system whereby there about six priority areas his government wants to put in place. On of the issues he was faced with is corruption, which was rampant within the public and private sector he inherited. And in the process he came up with a system where he tried to bring Malawi on the road to economic recovery by fighting corruption,” he said.
Mtumodzi said the President organized a forum for a discussion on ways to put the country on an economic recovery.
“The President called a round table discussion whereby people from all sectors met and made and discussed and formulated the roadmap for Malawi’s economic recovery…So as of now, we have created a situation whereby there is food security and the distribution of fertilizers for the agricultural subsidy is in progress,” Mtumodzi noted.
He explained efforts the government is putting in place to spur on the economy.
“The government has set up communication as a priority whereby roads are vigorously being constructed, economic recovery and the fight against corruption is being given a priority to better the lives of all Malawians and people are seeing what the government has been doing so far,” he said.
Mtumodzi said the government has decreased inflation among other programs to encourage private sector input to boost the economy.
“The issue of the lending rate which has been reduced to twenty percent is one of the incentives that has been put in place… the private sector wa also involved in the formulating of policies to encourage private investors in the country,” he said.
