By The Zambian Economist Analyst | Opinion by Dr Kelvin Kamayoyo, Technical Advisor for African Rivers | 25 October 2026

Grand Inga could help reduce Africa’s electricity deficit if generation at the Congo River site is developed alongside the networks and institutions needed to deliver power. Its promise lies in the scale of the resource; its success will be measured by electricity reaching homes and productive businesses.

Africa’s energy challenge, in my view, is a failure to turn abundant natural potential into dependable services. Saying the continent has an energy-harnessing problem draws attention to that gap. It does not remove the need to build generation, strengthen utilities or extend connections to people who remain beyond the grid.

For Zambia, the question is practical. A mine needs power when production is scheduled. A small food processor needs refrigeration that works. An entrepreneur deciding whether to buy equipment needs confidence that electricity will be available at a price the business can afford.

What is Grand Inga, and how much power could it provide?

Grand Inga describes the ambition to develop much more of the hydropower resource at Inga, on the Congo River in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). It should not be confused with a completed 42,000 MW power station.

The World Bank’s Inga factsheet, updated in June 2025, puts the site’s potential at around 42,000 MW. It describes a possible sequence of up to eight projects. Existing Inga 1 and Inga 2 plants already operate at the site; Inga 3 would be the next development.

That distinction matters when assessing claims about Africa’s power supply. Potential generating capacity is different from dependable output. Design, river conditions and plant availability affect production, while transmission losses and network constraints affect what reaches customers. The headline capacity figure cannot establish a final tariff or a commissioning date.

What has moved beyond discussion?

In June 2025, the World Bank approved a US$250 million credit as the first phase of a US$1 billion Inga 3 Development Program. The support begins with local development, institutional capacity and preparation rather than the delivery of a finished hydropower plant.

The Bank’s April 2026 implementation report records that the programme became effective on 2 February 2026. It also rates overall risk as high, including governance, institutional capacity and environmental and social risks.

My argument is that Africa should advance credible projects with greater urgency. Urgency must produce better decisions: published studies, accountable procurement and financing arrangements that survive changes of government. It cannot substitute for them.

Why would Zambia need more than a dam?

A power station in the DRC would not automatically end Zambia’s power deficit. Electricity would need an available route through the regional network, and buyers would need contracts they can honour. Utilities and regulators would have to resolve how power is priced, dispatched and paid for across borders.

For Zambia, the investment case should therefore examine the delivered cost of electricity, including transmission and other charges. A low generation cost at the source may still produce an expensive import if the route requires extensive new infrastructure or financing carries a heavy premium.

Long-term imports could support industrial planning if supply is dependable. They should be assessed alongside domestic generation, storage where appropriate and measures to reduce network losses. Zambia cannot postpone investments that can improve supply sooner while waiting for a project of Inga’s scale.

Our coverage of the African Hydro Symposium preparations examines the connection between hydropower, water security and climate resilience. The wider discussion belongs within our Business & Economy coverage and Zambia Economy 2026 series.

How does Inga fit a continental electricity market?

The African Union’s African Single Electricity Market and Continental Power Systems Masterplan provide a framework for connecting national systems and expanding regional trade. The AU linked these initiatives to practical work on distribution-grid loss reduction in Lusaka in April 2026.

The lesson is that new generation and better networks need to advance together. Regional power pools can help countries share resources, but an interconnector is useful only if its operating arrangements work and power can move when buyers need it.

Industrialisation needs those details settled. Processing minerals or agricultural produce closer to their source requires businesses to commit money over many years. Predictable electricity supply helps them make that decision; an unfinanced promise does not.

Can hydropower protect the Congo River?

River health should be a condition of development. It would be misleading, however, to assume that building a dam automatically restores a river, reduces flooding or improves fisheries and navigation. Outcomes depend on the design and its effects across the basin, including downstream.

Studies must establish how altered flows would affect habitats and the livelihoods of river-dependent communities. People facing displacement or loss of access to land and fisheries need meaningful participation, credible compensation arrangements and enforceable remedies.

The IFC’s Performance Standard 6 sets out a mitigation hierarchy: avoid impacts, minimise them, restore where possible and consider offsets for residual harm. Its biodiversity requirements differ by habitat; critical habitat calls for net gains, not merely a blanket promise of “zero net loss”. Meeting safeguards also does not, by itself, guarantee finance.

The Africa Water Vision 2063 and Policy, launched in February 2026, places water security, resilient ecosystems and transboundary cooperation within Africa’s development agenda. Inga should be tested against those aims through evidence and measurable commitments.

Who should benefit first?

Congolese communities must see a credible route from hosting the resource to receiving better services and economic opportunities. Regional exports should form part of a development programme that explains who receives electricity, who pays for the infrastructure and how local livelihoods are protected.

For investors, the questions are equally concrete: who will buy the power, on what terms, and who bears construction, currency and payment risk? Publishing those answers makes the debate more useful than repeating the project’s theoretical capacity.

Africa should pursue Inga’s potential with purpose. The standard of success is affordable electricity delivered to people and enterprises, with the Congo River’s ecological functions protected and affected communities able to hold project institutions to account.

This contributor opinion was edited for clarity and checked against the linked primary sources. Project potential is distinguished from committed capacity and electricity delivered. The policy recommendations are the author’s views.

Featured photograph: existing infrastructure at the Inga site and the Congo River, photographed in March 2019. It does not depict a completed Grand Inga project. Photo: Χρίστος Ιμμανοελ / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0. Cropped and resized; the adapted photograph is available under the same licence.

About the author

Dr Kelvin Kamayoyo

Economist, International Trade Law Scholar and Investment Consultant | Lusaka, Zambia

Dr Kelvin Kamayoyo has over 13 years of experience across academia, policy and the private sector. He is Programme Director of the Purposive Mega-Infrastructure Investment Programme, Lead Consultant at Acacia Trade and Development Consulting Group and Technical Advisor for African Rivers. He is an adjunct lecturer at ESAMI, NIPA and Zambia Open University, and a former board member of the Economics Association of Zambia.

Read his contributor profile · More by Dr Kamayoyo · kamayoyokm@gmail.com

Explore the Business Directory and Events. Read about the publication or contact the newsroom. Third-party photographs retain their stated licences.

WARNING!
All rights reserved. This material and all other digital content on this website may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed, in whole or in part, without the prior express permission of The Zambian Economist. Where permission is granted, the content must be clearly credited to “The Zambian Economist,” with “www.zambianeconomist.com” prominently displayed.
WhatsApp: +260775574228 | Email: info@zambianeconomist.com
© 2026 The Zambian Economist.

Work With The Zambian Economist

• Advertise With Us
• List With Us
• Submit an Article

By Dr. Kelvin Kamayoyo, Technical Advisor, African Rivers

24th October, 2026

The world is not facing isolated conflicts. It is facing an unrelenting, mutating pandemic of war, and it is doing so exactly when nature is preparing its own assault, observed Dr. Kelvin Kamayoyo, Technical Advisor for African Rivers. Super El Niño of 2026-2027 is no longer a forecast, it is an incoming global shock. Yet the international system is bankrupt, distracted and defenceless.

A Pandemic of War

On Thursday, 22nd October 2026, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres made a statement that should have shaken every capital. Speaking ahead of his trip to Egypt, he warned: “War travels: through energy markets, shipping lanes, supply chains and financial systems” (Guterres, 2026).

He continued: “We are now witnessing an El Niño of war.” Guterres was right to use the metaphor. He told reporters in New York: “Today, conflicts are not only intensifying. They are expanding.” From the Middle East to Ukraine to Sudan, we are seeing a contagion. This is not an accident. It is a direct failure of preventive diplomacy. The United Nations has not maximized the technique of shuttle diplomacy as a means to prevent and stop conflicts.

The Case for Shuttle Diplomacy

Shuttle diplomacy, where a mediator moves between parties who refuse to meet face-to-face, remains one of the most effective tools to break deadlocks. As Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Henry Kissinger (1973), who pioneered modern shuttle diplomacy in the Middle East, argued, sustainable peace is achieved not by demanding public surrender but by creating private space for compromise through persistent, discreet mediation (Kissinger, 1982). The UN must return to that model: less press conference, more shuttle.

This failure has a price. The famous Indian author Arundhati Roy, in The God of Small Things (1997) and later in The Cost of Living (1999), described precisely this moment: how big wars, big dams and big powers crush small lives, and how the poor pay for the violence of the powerful. Roy argued that people must reclaim narrative power and confront empire through determined, non-violent civil resistance that links ecological justice to anti-war struggles (Roy, 1999). Her warning is now reality.

The Blowback on Our Streets

The blowback is already on our streets. Referring to protests in Europe and elsewhere over the rising cost of living, Guterres said, “The violence and destruction we have seen on the streets is unacceptable and those responsible for criminal activities must be held accountable. At the same time, we cannot let intolerable violence obscure the legitimate and very real grievances of the many peaceful protestors.”

This tension between legitimate grievance and illegitimate violence was described with moral clarity by Nobel Peace Laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu (1984). Tutu maintained that when institutions ignore peaceful protest against injustice and poverty, they breed anger, but that violence can never be the answer and must be answered with justice, not repression (Tutu, 1999). The solution is not to criminalize the protester but to address the cost-of-living crisis that war itself is fuelling.

The spread is deliberate. “From the Middle East to Ukraine to Sudan, we are seeing civilians and civilian infrastructure deliberately thrust into the line of fire,” Guterres warned.

The great Nigerian author Chinua Achebe diagnosed this pathology decades ago. In Things Fall Apart (1958) and There Was a Country (2012), Achebe showed how when the centre cannot hold, when political failure turns people against their own communities, civilians become the battlefield (Achebe, 1958). His counsel remains relevant: societies minimize escalation not through revenge but through restoring community dialogue, truth-telling and inclusive governance.

Guterres was blunt: “Attacks directed against civilians and civilian objects are prohibited under international law. They must stop.” This is not a political opinion; it is law. Nobel Peace Laureate Kofi Annan (2001) consistently defended this principle, arguing that sovereignty can never be a shield for targeting civilians and that the protection of civilians is the core test of international legitimacy (Annan, 2005).

Yemen and Palestine: Where the Test Fails

Nowhere is this test failing more than in Yemen and Palestine. On Yemen, the Secretary-General pointed to “escalating hostilities around the city of Ta’iz and elsewhere” and described continued Houthi attacks against civilian targets in Saudi Arabia as “totally unacceptable. We need restraint and Yemen needs a political horizon.”

We need to move beyond talking in New York to taking action on the ground. We must better appreciate the concerns of all parties to reach an endgame that yields a win-win and secures global peace and stability. As Nobel Peace Laureate President Jimmy Carter (2002) demonstrated through the Camp David Accords and his post-presidency work, lasting peace requires direct engagement with all actors, however difficult, and a commitment to win-win outcomes over zero-sum victories (Carter, 2010).

In the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Guterres said, “In Gaza, essential aid is still being severely restricted by Israel ahead of the fast-approaching winter.” In the occupied West Bank, “Palestinians continue to suffer daily attacks by Israeli settlers. The clear goal is to drive communities off their land.”

There is an urgent need to innovate ways to promote coexistence in one area and share common prosperity. Nobel Peace Laureate Nelson Mandela (1993) described this challenge best. He argued that true coexistence is not about one group disappearing, but about building a shared future where both peoples enjoy equal dignity, freedom and prosperity in the same land (Mandela, 1994).

The Moral Obscenity of Our Priorities

Finally, the moral obscenity of our priorities. “The situation is out of control,” Guterres said. The World Food Programme “urgently needs 450 million US dollars to feed people in Gaza and the West Bank for the next six months,” an amount equivalent to around 90 minutes of global military spending.

It is sad to learn about this unfortunate comparison. But sadness is not a strategy. The United Nations should call for a 30-day global ceasefire of all wars so that global military savings can be channelled to El Niño response worldwide.

As the renowned Kenyan environmentalist and Nobel Peace Laureate Wangari Maathai (2004) warned, we cannot separate peace from the environment. In Unbowed (2006), Maathai argued that resource scarcity, environmental degradation and conflict form a vicious cycle, and that protecting the environment and feeding people is the most effective peace work (Maathai, 2006).

Super El Niño 2026-2027: The Incoming Shock

This is why the Super El Niño 2026-2027 will be catastrophic. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has confirmed that El Niño amplifies extreme weather which include droughts, floods and food system collapse (IPCC, 2023). The World Meteorological Organization warns that 2026-2027 is likely to be one of the strongest events on record (WMO, 2026).

Africa and the most vulnerable nations will be hit first and worst. With 60% of Africa’s population dependent on rain-fed agriculture, with energy grids already collapsing, with shipping lanes disrupted by war, the continent has no buffer (African Development Bank, 2024). When the rains fail in the Zambezi and the Horn, and floods wash away infrastructure in West Africa, there will be no global supply chain to rescue us because war has already broken it.

And recovery will undoubtedly take longer. A nation at war cannot rebuild a dam, cannot restore a crop, cannot move food aid. War travels, and so will famine. The world must choose to continue funding 90 minutes of war, or fund 6 months of life.

For comments contact the researcher and author on email: kamayoyokm@gmail.com

References

• Achebe, C. (1958) Things Fall Apart. London: Heinemann.
• African Development Bank (2024) African Economic Outlook 2024: Climate and Food Security. Abidjan: AfDB.
• Annan, K. (2005) In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All. New York: United Nations.
• Carter, J. (2010) White House Diary. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
• Guterres, A. (2026) Statement by UN Secretary-General: War travels through energy markets, shipping lanes, supply chains and financial systems. New York: United Nations, 22 October.
• IPCC (2023) Climate Change 2023: Synthesis Report. Geneva: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
• Kissinger, H. (1982) Years of Upheaval. Boston: Little, Brown.
• Maathai, W. (2006) Unbowed: A Memoir. New York: Knopf.
• Mandela, N. (1994) Long Walk to Freedom. Boston: Little, Brown.
• Roy, A. (1997) The God of Small Things. New Delhi: IndiaInk.
• Roy, A. (1999) The Cost of Living. New York: Modern Library.
• Tutu, D. (1999) No Future Without Forgiveness. New York: Doubleday.
• WMO (2026) WMO El Niño/La Niña Update October 2026. Geneva: World Meteorological Organization.

WARNING! All rights reserved. This material and all other digital content on this website may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed, in whole or in part, without the prior express permission of The Zambian Economist. Where permission is granted, the content must be clearly credited to “The Zambian Economist,” with “www.zambianeconomist.com” prominently displayed.

WhatsApp: +260775574228 | Email: info@zambianeconomist.com © 2026 The Zambian Economist.

Work With The Zambian Economist

• Advertise With Us
• List With Us
• Submit an Article

By Dr Kelvin Kamayoyo, Technical Advisor, African Rivers | The Zambian Economist Analyst

Aliko Dangote must emulate Alfred Bernhard Nobel and turn industrial wealth into a perpetual legacy.

Dangote’s achievements are admirable and motivate many people across Africa and beyond. Forbes ranks him as the continent’s richest person, with an estimated net worth of US$28.5 billion in its 2026 list (Forbes, 2026). He started a small trading business in Lagos in 1977. He went on to build Africa’s largest cement producer and to commission the 650,000 barrels-per-day Dangote Refinery in Lekki (Dangote Group, 2024). In doing so, he has shown that large-scale, African-led industrialisation is possible.

His journey is about more than accumulating wealth. It is about possibility, and about proving that an African can build at global scale from Africa.

Success as a story others can learn from

African literature has long understood this kind of motivational power. In Things Fall Apart (1958), Chinua Achebe traces how Okonkwo rises from his father’s poverty to prominence in Umuofia through hard work and resilience. Achebe also shows that personal success means little when it is cut off from the community that gives it meaning (Achebe, 1958). Dangote’s story carries the same double lesson.

What sets Dangote apart is his willingness to talk about how he built his fortune. He has spoken at investor forums, universities and policy roundtables about patient capital, reinvestment, managing debt and building despite poor infrastructure. Research on entrepreneurship finds that visible role models reduce the uncertainty that new entrants feel and make wealth creation seem learnable (Bosma et al., 2012).

To emulate, in this context, means to imitate a model and then surpass it. It is not blind copying. It is deliberate learning that turns admiration into a better, locally relevant legacy. That is what Dangote should do with Nobel. Dangote has not published any formal commentary on Nobel, but the stated purpose of his Aliko Dangote Foundation is close to Nobel’s final intent: that private fortune should ultimately serve the public (Bishop and Green, 2008).

How Nobel turned a fortune into a permanent institution

Alfred Nobel (1833 to 1896) was a Swedish chemist, engineer and industrialist. He patented dynamite in 1867, held 355 patents and built an international business in explosives and armaments, with interests in his brothers’ oil company in Baku (Fant, 1993).

According to a widely told account, a French newspaper mistook the 1888 death of his brother Ludvig for his own and ran an obituary describing him as “the merchant of death”. Historians have struggled to locate the original article, but the story captures a real concern: Nobel thought hard about how he would be remembered (Sohlman, 1983).

He signed his last will and testament on 27 November 1895 at the Swedish-Norwegian Club in Paris and died on 10 December 1896. The will left about 94 per cent of his estate, some 31 million Swedish kronor, to a fund whose annual returns would reward those who had “conferred the greatest benefit to humankind” (Nobel Foundation, 2024). Estimates put that sum at more than SEK 2 billion in today’s money. The prizes were to cover five fields: physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace. The Nobel Foundation was set up in 1900 to carry out the will (Lundestad, 2001).

Nobel’s achievement was threefold. He turned unease about his reputation into purpose. He made excellence universal rather than national, since the will specified that nationality should not count. And he made his legacy perpetual by creating an endowment rather than a one-off gift (Nobel Foundation, 2024). He understood that society needs lasting institutional incentives to honour those who move humanity forward.

The uncomfortable question

The question that follows is uncomfortable but necessary. What lasting, inspirational legacy will Aliko Dangote be remembered for in 2126 if he does not establish a “Dangote Prize Laureates” programme?

The Indian author Arundhati Roy has long argued that asking awkward questions is not disloyalty but a way of seeing clearly, because it strips away pretence so that a society can confront an issue honestly (Roy, 2008).

Factories can be nationalised. Refineries can become obsolete. Fortunes can be divided and diluted. A prize endures. In a hundred years, the Dangote Refinery may be a museum. A Dangote Prize for African Industrial Innovation, for Food Security, for Affordable Housing or for Energy Access could still be honouring African talent. Nobel understood that wealth without an institution to carry its purpose dies with its owner.

A challenge to African scholarship

To emulate Nobel, Dangote must institutionalise inspiration. That is also a challenge to academia. Scholars should spend more time analysing the business and investment models Dangote has used and test which of them work in African conditions. Management research on African business still leans heavily on models imported from the West (George et al., 2016).

Dangote’s approach combines vertical integration, backward integration into raw materials, the management of political risk and long-horizon domestic capital. It has drawn both praise and criticism. Akinyoade and Uche (2018), for example, examine how far close ties with the state shaped the growth of Dangote Cement. That debate is itself a reason for serious study. The approach deserves its own body of research, which might be called the Dangote Model of African Industrial Capitalism.

Legacy is also tested now

A prize is about the future, but legacy is also tested in the present.

The World Meteorological Organization expects the strengthening El Niño of 2026/2027 to bring drier conditions and drought risk to much of southern Africa, with above-normal temperatures across the region (WMO, 2026). The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has found that El Niño events worsen food insecurity in vulnerable regions (IPCC, 2023). The last El Niño, in 2023/2024, left about 68 million people in the Southern African Development Community in need of help, according to SADC (SADC, 2024). Zambia declared a national disaster during that drought. For more on the current outlook, see our explainer, Understanding the ‘Supersized’ El Niño of 2026/2027, and Dr Kamayoyo’s earlier piece, Supersized El Niño 2026/2027 To Stress Rivers.

The Kenyan Nobel Peace laureate Wangari Maathai, founder of the Green Belt Movement, wrote that environmental damage and poverty feed each other, and that the burden falls hardest on the poor. Her answer was collective resilience: communities planting trees, protecting watersheds and supporting one another (Maathai, 2009). In that spirit, Dangote should consider donating food, children’s books, shoes, clothing and temporary shelter to communities hit by the 2026/2027 El Niño.

Where wealth meets morality

This is where wealth meets humanity. The Scottish-American industrialist Andrew Carnegie set out the duty plainly in his 1889 essay, later known as The Gospel of Wealth. He argued that the rich are trustees of their fortunes and should use them for the good of the community during their lifetimes, warning that “the man who dies thus rich dies disgraced” (Carnegie, 1889). That principle later shaped modern philanthropy, from Rockefeller to Gates (Bishop and Green, 2008). Wealth that does not feed, clothe and shelter people in a climate crisis loses moral legitimacy.

Literature has taught this lesson too. In Schindler’s Ark (1982), the Australian novelist Thomas Keneally tells the story of Oskar Schindler, an industrialist who turned his factory and fortune from war profiteering into a means of rescuing the people who worked for him (Keneally, 1982). Achebe’s No Longer at Ease (1960) returns to the tension between individual advancement and obligation to the community. Both writers show that wealth without moral responsibility destroys, and that wealth with a social conscience rebuilds.

Africa’s Schindler moment

Aliko Dangote has built what no other African has built. He has earned wide admiration. The next step is a kind of immortality: not of the body, but of purpose. Nobel turned dynamite into a peace prize. Dangote can turn cement and petrol into prizes for human progress.

Establishing the Dangote Prize Laureates would be Africa’s own Schindler moment, turning an industrial fortune into permanent moral capital. It would mean that in 2126, young African scientists, writers, industrialists and peacemakers still strive because Dangote once lived. That legacy would be worth more than being the richest person on the continent.

About the author

Dr Kelvin Kamayoyo

Economist, International Trade Law Scholar and Investment Consultant | Lusaka, Zambia

Dr Kelvin Kamayoyo has over 13 years of experience across academia, policy and the private sector. He is Programme Director of the Purposive Mega-Infrastructure Investment Programme and Technical Advisor for African Rivers, and an adjunct lecturer at ESAMI, NIPA and Zambia Open University. A former board member of the Economics Association of Zambia, he writes on economics, international trade, local content, river ecosystems and climate change. He can be reached at kamayoyokm@gmail.com. Meet our contributors.

References

1. Achebe, C. (1958) Things Fall Apart. London: Heinemann.
2. Achebe, C. (1960) No Longer at Ease. London: Heinemann.
3. Akinyoade, A. and Uche, C. (2018) ‘Development built on crony capitalism? The case of Dangote Cement’, Business History, 60(6), pp. 833 to 858.
4. Bishop, M. and Green, M. (2008) Philanthrocapitalism: How the Rich Can Save the World. New York: Bloomsbury Press.
5. Bosma, N., Hessels, J., Schutjens, V., Van Praag, M. and Verheul, I. (2012) ‘Entrepreneurship and role models’, Journal of Economic Psychology, 33(2), pp. 410 to 424.
6. Carnegie, A. (1889) ‘Wealth’, North American Review, 148(391), pp. 653 to 664.
7. Dangote Group (2024) Annual Report 2023. Lagos: Dangote Industries Limited.
8. Fant, K. (1993) Alfred Nobel: A Biography. New York: Arcade Publishing.
9. Forbes (2026) The World’s Billionaires 2026. New York: Forbes Media.
10. George, G., Corbishley, C., Khayesi, J.N.O., Haas, M.R. and Tihanyi, L. (2016) ‘Bringing Africa in: Promising directions for management research’, Academy of Management Journal, 59(2), pp. 377 to 393.
11. IPCC (2023) Climate Change 2023: Synthesis Report. Geneva: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
12. Keneally, T. (1982) Schindler’s Ark. London: Hodder and Stoughton.
13. Lundestad, G. (2001) ‘The Nobel Peace Prize’, in The Nobel Prize: The First 100 Years. London: Imperial College Press.
14. Maathai, W. (2009) The Challenge for Africa. New York: Pantheon Books.
15. Nobel Foundation (2024) Alfred Nobel’s Will. Available at: https://www.nobelprize.org/alfred-nobel/alfred-nobels-will/ (Accessed: 23 October 2026).
16. Roy, A. (2008) The Shape of the Beast: Conversations with Arundhati Roy. New Delhi: Penguin Books.
17. SADC (2024) Regional Humanitarian Appeal in Response to the 2023/2024 El Niño-Induced Drought and Floods. Gaborone: Southern African Development Community.
18. Sohlman, R. (1983) The Legacy of Alfred Nobel. London: Bodley Head.
19. WMO (2026) ‘El Niño will unleash multiple hazards in South-West Indian Ocean region’, 1 October. Geneva: World Meteorological Organization.

Related reading: Africa Must Prepare Now for the Unrelenting 2026 El Niño Wave.

WARNING! All rights reserved. This material and all other digital content on this website may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed, in whole or in part, without the prior express permission of The Zambian Economist. Where permission is granted, the content must be clearly credited to “The Zambian Economist,” with “www.zambianeconomist.com” prominently displayed.

WhatsApp: +260775574228 | Email: info@zambianeconomist.com
© 2026 The Zambian Economist.

Work With The Zambian Economist

• Advertise With Us
• List With Us
• Submit an Article

By Dr. Krisztián Galánthai Fekete, Contributor

Zambia is trying to give its landowners written, registered proof of what they own, and it is doing so door to door. The effort is worth backing. Its success will rest less on the technology behind it than on the families, enumerators, officials and chiefs who make each boundary true.

Start with a simple question

Ask a family in Lusaka a simple question. If someone said tomorrow that your plot is not yours, what could you show them? For many households the honest answer is very little. Maybe an old letter. Maybe the word of a neighbour.

That is not a small worry. Sylvia Masebo, the Minister of Lands and Natural Resources, put numbers on it in January 2026. Zambia has about 1.2 million numbered properties, she said, and only about 450,000 of them carry a registered title deed. In her words, more than half of the country’s properties lack full legal protection.

So the question at the kitchen table is also a national one. The government has decided to answer it at scale.

How is Zambia’s land titling programme carried out?

Answering it at scale means going house by house. Under the National Land Titling Programme, the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources works with Medici Land Governance, which signed its first agreement with the ministry in August 2018. At the time the company was the blockchain land registry subsidiary of the American online retailer Overstock.

The method is practical. Locally hired enumerators carry tablets and knock on doors. They record who owns the plot, who shares it and where its edges run. Aerial images help draw the map. By January 2026, the minister said, the programme had issued more than 232,000 offer letters. Medici describes the national aim, set with the ministry, as 4 million certificates of title.

The credit here is shared. The ministry set the goal and carries the responsibility. The company brings tools and teams. Families open their doors. Without all of them, nothing moves.

Why does a title deed matter to a family?

Once the enumerator leaves, what has the family actually gained? More than a document. A title deed settles arguments before they start. It can be passed on to children without a fight. And it can support a loan for a shop or a roof, which matters in a country where small businesses still struggle to borrow because lenders want collateral they can verify.

There is a bigger idea behind this. The Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto set it out in The Mystery of Capital in 2000. He noticed that poor families often already own a great deal: houses, plots, small farms. Without papers, that wealth is stuck. You cannot borrow against it or sell it safely, and a bank will not take it as security. De Soto called this dead capital.

A title changes that. The same plot, with the same house on it, becomes something the whole economy can see and trust. Dead capital becomes live capital, which is why titling is more than paperwork for Zambia. It is one of the quiet foundations of growth.

In the best case, I believe this could help lift many Zambian families out of poverty. I am honestly not sure how far it will reach, and nobody can promise a number. A title is not a loan, and a loan is not a business. But it opens a door that was closed before.

The same need in Lundazi

That door matters just as much outside the city. In September 2025, Chief Mphamba of Lundazi District in Eastern Province issued 259 customary land certificates to women. The project was run by the Lundazi District Women Association, with technical support from Zambia Land Alliance and Women for Change and Swedish funding through We Effect. The chief reminded the women that the certificates do not allow them to sell the land, and urged them to put it to good use.

Lundazi and Lusaka are very different places, and a customary certificate is not a state title deed. Yet the need is the same. People want to know the ground under them is theirs.

Where machines help, and where they stop

That need is old. The tools serving it are new, and they improve every year. Some of the mapping uses machine learning to find buildings in aerial images. Records can be stored so they are hard to change in secret.

Soon we will add SI, superintelligence, the technology we used to call AI. It will check records, spot errors and speed up approvals. I believe robots will also meet us in homes, in offices and in dangerous work underground, taking on the heavy and risky jobs so people can do more of what they love.

Still, no machine can stand at a fence line and get two neighbours to agree. That takes patience, a familiar face and sometimes an elder. The tablet records the answer. People find it.

What can families do before the enumerators arrive?

If the work is coming to your area, a few steps help:

• Keep any papers you already have in one safe place.
• Talk with your neighbours about where your boundaries are before the survey team comes.
• If a plot is shared with a spouse or a sibling, make sure every name is given.
• If you already hold an offer letter, ask your local lands office what the next step is.

Small actions like these make the big programme work faster for everyone.

A promise worth keeping

Four million certificates is a large promise. It will take years, and there will be delays. That is normal for work this big.

But each certificate is a small promise kept to one family. Machines will help count them. Neighbours, officials and chiefs will make them true.

About the author

Dr. Krisztián Galánthai Fekete is an investor, computer scientist and philosopher. He is the author of Find Your Meaning in 60 Days, In the Age of AI and Robotics, which offers sixty short daily principles for keeping work and life human as machines grow more capable. The book is available on Amazon.

Sources

• News Diggers, 4 January 2026: Masebo on title deeds and offer letters
• Medici Land Governance: Systematic Land Titling (4 million certificates, with the Ministry)
• Lusaka Times, 2 August 2018: Ministry of Lands agreement with Medici Land Governance
• Overstock news release, 1 November 2018: Medici Land Governance as an Overstock subsidiary
• CoinDesk, 30 April 2021: enumerators with tablets going door to door
• Coordinates, April 2021: machine learning on drone imagery at Medici Land Governance
• Lusaka Times, 14 September 2025: 259 Lundazi women get customary land certificates
• IMF Finance & Development, March 2001: Hernando de Soto, The Mystery of Capital
• Lincoln Institute of Land Policy: The Influence of de Soto’s The Mystery of Capital

Related coverage

• The SME Credit Gap: Why Zambian Small Businesses Still Can’t Borrow Affordably
• Extreme Poverty Fell to 48%. Is Zambia’s Growth Reaching Ordinary Households?
• Musokotwane’s Day-One Message: Zambia Moves From Stabilisation to Growth

The views expressed are the author’s own. Have an analysis to share? Submit an article to The Zambian Economist.

WARNING! All rights reserved. This material and all other digital content on this website may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed, in whole or in part, without the prior express permission of The Zambian Economist. Where permission is granted, the content must be clearly credited to “The Zambian Economist,” with “www.zambianeconomist.com” prominently displayed.

WhatsApp: +260775574228 | Email: info@zambianeconomist.com
© 2026 The Zambian Economist.

Work With The Zambian Economist

• Advertise With Us
• List With Us
• Submit an Article

By Nathan Meleki, Contributor

A community may have a borehole included in its development plans, yet residents may still be waiting for water long after the project was expected to be completed. The gap between what was planned and what is delivered raises questions about funding, implementation and the reasons for delays. Zambia’s Access to Information Act No. 24 of 2023 gives citizens a legal means of seeking information that can help explain these gaps.

What the audit shows

The Citizens’ Guide to the Auditor General’s Report for the 2025 financial year records that K312,862 was spent on allowances and fuel for 15 boreholes in Muchinga Province, none of which was drilled. Nationally, only 374 of the 947 planned new boreholes were drilled. These figures highlight a difference between planned public services and actual delivery, making access to information important for understanding how projects are implemented.

For residents, the concern is practical. When a borehole is not drilled, the expected water supply remains unavailable. When a classroom block is unfinished, learners may continue studying in inadequate facilities. Understanding why these projects remain incomplete requires more than observation; it requires information about the decisions, resources and work involved.

What the law allows

The Access to Information Act provides a framework through which citizens can seek such information from public authorities and other bodies covered by the law, subject to its provisions and exemptions. Requests can help establish what was budgeted, how much was spent, which activities were undertaken and what remains outstanding. These records provide a basis for understanding project implementation without assuming that every delay indicates wrongdoing.

How to request information

Under the Access to Information Act and the Access to Information (General) Regulations, 2025, citizens can follow these steps:

1. Identify the institution holding the information, such as the public authority responsible for the project.
2. Complete Form I with the required details and a clear description of the information requested.
3. Submit the request physically or electronically to the relevant information holder.
4. Await a response within the period prescribed by law.

The law also provides for oral requests in specified circumstances.

A resident seeking information about an unfinished project could request its approved budget, expenditure records, contractor details, implementation schedule or progress reports. The information obtained can help the community compare the original plans with the work completed and seek clarification from the responsible authorities.

Information is not an accusation

However, access to information is not, by itself, proof of wrongdoing. Projects can face financial, administrative or technical challenges, and records must be considered in context. The purpose of a request is to establish the facts and understand the circumstances before drawing conclusions.

This is where the law connects public information to service delivery. Public expenditure is not only about the amount allocated or spent; it is also about the services intended to reach communities. Records can help residents understand the relationship between planned spending and actual outcomes, while giving them a clearer basis for engaging institutions responsible for implementation.

A right for every citizen

The right to access information is not reserved for journalists and researchers. Ordinary Zambians can use it to seek answers about projects in their wards and constituencies. When residents can obtain reliable records, discussions about public services can move beyond speculation towards specific questions about plans, expenditure and delivery.

Ultimately, the Access to Information Act provides a window through which citizens can better understand public affairs. Its value lies in enabling people to seek documented answers about decisions and projects that affect their lives. When communities can access information and engage authorities on the basis of evidence, they are better placed to understand public spending and contribute to accountability in service delivery.

Nathan Meleki is a contributor to The Zambian Economist. Views expressed are the author’s own.

Related: Zambia’s 2025 audit: K3.56bn in health arrears and K626.64m in uncollected mining penalties | Kawina Takes the Chair at Public Accounts Committee | Auditor General Explained

WARNING! All rights reserved. This material and all other digital content on this website may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed, in whole or in part, without the prior express permission of The Zambian Economist. Where permission is granted, the content must be clearly credited to “The Zambian Economist,” with “www.zambianeconomist.com” prominently displayed.

WhatsApp: +260775574228 | Email: info@zambianeconomist.com
© 2026 The Zambian Economist.

Work With The Zambian Economist

• Advertise With Us
• List With Us
• Submit an Article

Trees are the nerves of planet earth, observed Dr. Kelvin Kamayoyo, Technical Advisor for African Rivers. In human physiology, a nerve is a bundle of fibres that transmits signals between the brain and different parts of the body, enabling sensation, response and life itself (Tortora and Derrickson, 2017). Without nerves, the body cannot feel, breathe properly or regulate itself. In the same way, trees function as the ecological nerves of the planet. They are a source of fresh air, they help to cool the atmosphere, and they sustain human life (IPCC, 2023). They recharge the energy of planet earth through photosynthesis, sequestering carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen that gives life to the atmosphere (FAO, 2022).

In an era of escalating climate change, we need to preserve the environment by co-existing with nature in order to defeat global warming. Human activities remain the major source of global warming, contributing over 75% of greenhouse gas emissions through deforestation, fossil fuel combustion and unsustainable land use (IPCC, 2023; UNEP, 2023). Therefore, every business entity must plant at least two trees to support planet earth, as part of its corporate responsibility.

The environmental importance of trees is evident in the multiple regulatory functions they perform that are indispensable to environmental stability. First, they cool the atmosphere through evapotranspiration and canopy shading, reducing urban temperatures by 2 to 8 degrees Celsius (Bowler et al., 2010). Second, they help to prevent floods and store water, supporting the breathing of planet earth in extreme temperature seasons. Root systems increase soil infiltration and reduce surface runoff, while forested catchments can store up to 40% more water than degraded lands (Ellison et al., 2017). Third, trees store carbon and conserve biodiversity, providing habitat for 80% of terrestrial species (FAO, 2022).

Africa is endowed with significant forest resources but is losing them rapidly. The continent has an estimated 130 billion to 180 billion trees, accounting for about 20% of the global tree population (Crowther et al., 2015; FAO, 2022). However, Africa loses between 3.4 and 4.4 million hectares of forest annually, translating into an estimated 600 million to 800 million trees cut per year for charcoal, agriculture expansion and settlement (FAO, 2022; UNEP, 2023). This rate of loss undermines climate adaptation and threatens river systems, including the Nile, Congo and Zambezi.

Global experience shows that inspiring leadership in tree planting campaigns has delivered measurable environmental benefits, and several examples demonstrate this. In Africa, two notable examples stand out. In Kenya, the late Professor Wangari Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement in 1977, which has facilitated the planting of over 51 million trees and promoted women-led environmental conservation (Maathai, 2006). In Ethiopia, the Green Legacy Initiative championed by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed mobilized over 25 billion seedlings since 2019, with a single-day record of 350 million trees planted in 2019, significantly improving landscape restoration (UNEP, 2023).

In Europe, tree planting has been institutionalized in a similar manner. In the United Kingdom, Sir David Attenborough has been a leading voice for rewilding and the National Trust’s Plant a Tree campaign, which aims to plant 20 million trees by 2030 (National Trust, 2023). In Germany, Felix Finkbeiner, founder of Plant-for-the-Planet at the age of 9, has inspired the planting of over 14 billion trees globally through youth mobilization (Plant-for-the-Planet, 2023).

In the United States, two campaigns are particularly transformative. The American Forests organization, founded in 1875, has led forest restoration across all 50 states and planted over 65 million trees (American Forests, 2023). The Arbor Day Foundation, initiated by J. Sterling Morton, has mobilized over 500 million trees planted in the US and globally through community-driven programmes (Arbor Day Foundation, 2023).

In China, massive state-led afforestation has changed the climate narrative. The Three-North Shelter Forest Programme, also known as the Great Green Wall, has planted over 66 billion trees since 1978 to combat desertification (FAO, 2022). The Ant Forest initiative by Alibaba, led by entrepreneur Jack Ma’s ecosystem, has enabled over 650 million users to plant over 400 million real trees through low-carbon behaviour tracking (UNEP, 2023).

In Australia, tree planting is central to land care. Dr. Andrew Campbell was instrumental in the National Landcare Programme that has supported the planting of over 80 million trees (Campbell, 2020). Similarly, former Australian of the Year, Dr. Jon Dee, founded Planet Ark’s National Tree Day, which has seen over 26 million trees planted by over 5 million volunteers since 1996 (Planet Ark, 2023). These examples show that when governments, civil society and business unite, tree planting delivers cleaner air, cooler cities, restored watersheds and enhanced livelihoods (FAO, 2022).

While trees are vital, environmental science also shows that some old trees serve limited ecological purpose and need to be cut down and replaced for the sake of the environment. Trees grow, age and senesce, and their capacity to serve the environment becomes limited except to occupy space unnecessarily. Over-mature, diseased or dying trees have declining rates of photosynthesis, reduced carbon sequestration and become vulnerable to pests and fire (Stephenson et al., 2014; Thomas and Packham, 2007). Research indicates that carbon absorption efficiency peaks at maturity and declines in over-mature stands, and selective removal and replanting with vigorous young trees enhances net carbon uptake and forest health (Stephenson et al., 2014). Therefore, sustainable forest management requires selective harvesting of senescent trees and replanting with new, fast-growing indigenous species to rejuvenate the ecosystem.

Another approach to encourage the culture of tree planting, apart from the involuntary one through regulatory frameworks and penalties, is to adopt a voluntary approach by explaining to people and the business community the benefits of planting fruit trees. Fruit trees combine climate adaptation with income generation, nutrition and economic incentive (FAO, 2022). In Europe, community orchard programmes in Spain and Italy have integrated olive, apple and citrus tree planting into climate adaptation, creating rural jobs and reducing food miles (EU Commission, 2023). In Africa, the World Agroforestry Centre’s fruit tree portfolio in Kenya, Zambia and Malawi has promoted mango, avocado and baobab planting, improving household incomes by 30-40% while enhancing soil cover (ICRAF, 2022). In Australia, citrus and macadamia nut tree planting under the Farm Forestry programme in Queensland has transformed degraded lands, providing farmers with sustainable income streams while sequestering carbon (Campbell, 2020). Fruit tree planting thus transforms the climate adaptation agenda from a compliance burden into a business opportunity, making tree planting voluntary, profitable and culturally embedded.

In conclusion, trees are not optional; they are essential infrastructure for life, acting as the nerves that transmit life across the planet. They cool our cities, store our water, prevent our floods, clean our air and recharge the energy of planet earth. With Africa holding an estimated 130 billion trees but losing hundreds of millions annually, urgent action is needed (Crowther et al., 2015; FAO, 2022). The leadership demonstrated by campaigners from Kenya to China to Australia proves that restoration is possible. Therefore, combining regulatory frameworks with voluntary incentives such as fruit tree planting, and by ensuring that senescent trees are sustainably replaced, we can secure a resilient planet. Every business must now plant at least two trees. That is how we give life to the atmosphere and defeat climate change.

For comments, contact the researcher and author on email: kamayoyokm@gmail.com

References

• American Forests (2023) American Forests Annual Report 2023: Restoring Forests. Washington: American Forests.
• Arbor Day Foundation (2023) Arbor Day Foundation: 50 Years of Tree Planting. Nebraska: Arbor Day Foundation.
• Bowler, D.E., Buyung-Ali, L., Knight, T.M. and Pullin, A.S. (2010) Urban greening to cool towns and cities: A systematic review of the empirical evidence. Landscape and Urban Planning, 97(3), pp.147-155.
• Campbell, A. (2020) Landcare and Environmental Stewardship in Australia. Canberra: CSIRO Publishing.
• Crowther, T.W. et al. (2015) Mapping tree density at a global scale. Nature, 525(7568), pp.201-205.
• Ellison, D. et al. (2017) Trees, forests and water: Cool insights for a hot world. Global Environmental Change, 43, pp.51-61.
• EU Commission (2023) EU Agroforestry and Community Orchards Strategy. Brussels: European Commission.
• FAO (2022) The State of the World’s Forests 2022: Forest Pathways for Green Recovery. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization.
• ICRAF (2022) Fruits Trees for Food Security and Climate Resilience in Southern Africa. Nairobi: World Agroforestry Centre.
• IPCC (2023) Climate Change 2023: Synthesis Report. Geneva: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
• Maathai, W. (2006) Unbowed: A Memoir. New York: Knopf.
• National Trust (2023) Plant a Tree Programme: Progress Report. Swindon: National Trust UK.
• Planet Ark (2023) National Tree Day: 27 Years of Impact. Sydney: Planet Ark.
• Plant-for-the-Planet (2023) Trillion Tree Campaign: Youth-led Reforestation. Munich: Plant-for-the-Planet Foundation.
• Stephenson, N.L. et al. (2014) Rate of tree carbon accumulation increases continuously with tree size. Nature, 507(7490), pp.90-93.
• Thomas, P.A. and Packham, J.R. (2007) Ecology of Woodlands and Forests. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Tortora, G.J. and Derrickson, B. (2017) Principles of Anatomy and Physiology. 15th ed. Hoboken: Wiley.
• UNEP (2023) Emissions Gap Report 2023. Nairobi: United Nations Environment Programme.

Related: Dr Kamayoyo’s follow-up analysis, the looming super El Niño and the poisoning of world rivers, extends this warning to the Zambezi, Kafue and Luangwa.

Key Takeaways

• Zambia must treat climate risk as economic risk and build a growth model around resilience, argues Kelvin Chisanga.
• The SADC regional outlook points to below-normal rainfall over southern Zambia and wetter conditions in the north for the 2026/27 season.
• The 2023/24 drought cut agricultural output and opened a power-generation deficit exceeding 1,000MW, with hydropower supplying more than 80% of electricity.
• FAO reports a second consecutive year of increased cereal production, but Chisanga warns against complacency and calls for strategic reserves.
• The shift required: from reacting to climate disasters to pricing climate risk into every major investment and production decision.

Zambia must treat climate risk as an economic risk and should work out a key growth model and resilience strategy.

Zambia should enter the 2026/27 agricultural season with a risk-management mindset, because the emerging climate outlook points to potentially uneven rainfall across the country.

The SADC regional outlook indicates an increased likelihood of below-normal rainfall across much of central and southern Southern Africa, including southern Zambia, while wetter conditions are favoured in parts of northern Zambia.

My concern is not simply whether Zambia gets rain. The real economic question is whether the country can maintain production when rainfall becomes increasingly unpredictable.

One Shock, Many Transmission Channels

Zambia has just demonstrated how interconnected this risk is. The 2023/24 drought reduced agricultural production and created a power-generation deficit exceeding 1,000MW.

Because hydropower supplies more than 80% of electricity, a climate shock can move rapidly from the farm into the electricity system, manufacturing, mining, transport, food prices and household incomes.

This means climate resilience is now part of Zambia’s growth strategy. The country cannot build its 2031 economic ambitions around rainfall-dependent agriculture and predominantly hydro-dependent electricity.

Irrigation, climate-smart agriculture, solar and other generation sources, resilient infrastructure, water management, insurance and early-warning systems must increasingly become productive economic infrastructure.

The Recovery Should Not Breed Complacency

There is also an important opportunity. Zambia’s recent agricultural recovery shows what happens when weather conditions improve. The Food and Agriculture Organization reported an increase in cereal production for a second consecutive year. But that recovery should not create complacency, and there is a strong need for strategic reserve.

The strategic shift should be from reacting to climate disasters to pricing climate risk into every major investment and production decision.

For Zambia, the ultimate objective is simple: convert climate resilience from a cost on the budget into an investment that protects production, jobs, exports, energy security and household welfare.

The World Bank similarly identifies irrigation, resilient infrastructure, renewable-energy diversification, disaster-risk systems and private-sector investment as central to building Zambia’s climate resilience.

The views expressed in this opinion piece are the author’s own.

WARNING! All rights reserved. This material and all other digital content on this website may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed, in whole or in part, without the prior express permission of The Zambian Economist. Where permission is granted, the content must be clearly credited to “The Zambian Economist,” with “www.zambianeconomist.com” prominently displayed.

WhatsApp: +260775574228 | Email: info@zambianeconomist.com © 2026 The Zambian Economist.

Work With The Zambian Economist: Advertise With Us | List With Us | Submit an Article

For the six months to June 2026, Airtel’s revenue increased from K4.14 billion to K4.88 billion, while net profit rose from K674 million to K1.224 billion, an increase of about 82%. Earnings per share also increased, from K6.48 to K11.77.

The key issue is that profit grew substantially faster than revenue, pointing to stronger operating efficiency and monetisation rather than growth for its own sake.

The drivers include a growing customer base, rising data consumption, Airtel Money, digital financial services and continued network investment, including a reported US$107 million nationwide network expansion.

From an economic perspective, Airtel demonstrates how investment in digital infrastructure can generate scale, productivity, profits and shareholder wealth.

The broader lesson for Zambia is clear. Stabilisation must translate into productive private-sector investment, stronger companies, employment, tax revenues and, ultimately, higher household incomes.

Reporting and analysis by Kelvin Chisanga for The Zambian Economist.

About the author: Kelvin Chisanga is a Zambian economist and public policy analyst with over 15 years of multidisciplinary experience spanning ICT, mining, insurance, hospitality and media. He writes and comments regularly on monetary policy, macroeconomic stability and Zambia’s development agenda, with a particular focus on translating economic stabilisation into production, investment and improved household incomes.

Related: Musokotwane to Government ICT Staff: 572 Services Online, K9.78 Billion Collected, Now Build the Digital State.

Related coverage: Government, Airtel back e-waste skills drive for young Zambians.

Zambia enters the 2027-2031 Medium-Term Revenue Strategy with the tax take already at a record share of national income. The test of the final document is whether it grows revenue by widening the base and formalising the economy, rather than by raising rates on the same narrow formal sector.

Zambia’s revenue problem is not the size of the tax take. It is the narrowness of the base that produces it. That is the question the 2027-2031 Medium-Term Revenue Strategy must answer as consultations opened at Mulungushi International Conference Centre in Lusaka on Thursday, 3 September 2026: how to mobilise more domestic revenue for national development without undermining investment, production, jobs and household incomes.

The Ministry of Finance and National Planning is leading the process with the Budget Office and the Zambia Revenue Authority, with Secretary to the Treasury Felix Nkulukusa delivering the keynote under the theme “Mobilising Domestic Resources for Sustainable Growth and National Development.” The commitment to write the strategy was made in the 2026 Budget Address. It arrives at a moment when domestic revenue already finances 81.6% of the national Budget, which is why the Treasury’s domestic financing push carries so much weight.

A record take, and a heavy load

The Zambia Revenue Authority collected K160.6 billion in net revenue in 2025. Measured against the GDP figures the Zambia Statistics Agency published for that year, it comes to 22.1% of national income, the highest ratio the country has recorded. The target for 2026 is K185 billion, about 20% of a projected K923.7 billion economy.

ZRA’s share of the national revenue envelope has climbed from 55.7% in 2020 to a planned 73.1% in 2026 as donor funding has shrunk. The state now leans on the tax net for nearly three kwacha in every four it spends. A strategy written against that backdrop has to deliver, because the alternatives are borrowing or cutting services.

The money already in the room

A tax system that collects a fifth of GDP while leaving close to half of what the law expects uncollected is leaving money in the room. Audit-based research by the Zambia Revenue Authority and the United Nations University’s World Institute for Development Economics Research, which fed into the 2026 Budget, puts the total compliance gap at between 47 and 56%. The gap is driven mainly by corporate income tax misreporting, and corporate income tax alone is worth about K9.7 billion in recoverable revenue.

Closing part of that gap collects more than most rate rises would, and it does so without touching a single payslip or shelf price. The instruments are already in service: risk-based audits, data matching and the Smart Invoice system, which since January has tied one firm’s compliance to its customers’ input VAT position. The strategy’s job is to scale these tools and to publish the score.

Targets the public can hold the Treasury to

A strategy without targets is a speech. The document that comes out of these consultations should commit Government to clear annual and five-year measures: domestic revenue as a share of GDP, growth in registered taxpayers, compliance rates by tax head, a falling tax gap, and collection from sectors that are demonstrably under-taxed. Each should be published and monitored, so that progress, or its absence, is visible to everyone who pays.

Formalisation belongs on the same scoreboard. About 76% of Zambia’s workforce operates in informal employment, according to the 2023 Labour Force Survey. Programmes that graduate micro and small enterprises into the formal economy do more for the revenue base over five years than any single-year rate adjustment, because a formalised firm files returns, employs on the books and becomes visible to lenders.

What the exemptions budget buys

Every incentive and exemption has a price, and the country rarely sees the receipt. The strategy should order a review of tax expenditures against one question: for each kwacha forgone, what investment, jobs, exports and productivity came back? Incentives that cannot show results should be retired. Those that can should be kept, and their cost published annually. This is not hostility to investment. It is investment discipline, and serious investors respect a state that knows what its generosity costs.

Mining: a fair share without whiplash

Mining taxation needs the surest touch in the whole document. Zambia must secure a fair share of its mineral wealth while keeping the regime predictable enough to hold the investment pipeline now running through Vedanta’s Konkola mine and First Quantum’s Kansanshi and Sentinel expansions. The sector has absorbed enough regime changes to price instability into every new decision. A transparent, formula-driven regime held steady across the five years will raise more revenue than a squeeze in any single year that capital answers by slowing down.

Where over-taxation backfires

Households and the private sector set the ceiling on what tax policy can achieve. Raise the cost of formality, on paper or in practice, and activity migrates to where the tax authority cannot follow. For a small firm, the burden is rarely the headline rate alone; it is filing time, compliance costs and refunds that arrive late. Every measure in this strategy should carry a simple formality test: does this make staying formal more attractive, or less?

The cycle the strategy should build

My principle is simple: tax the economy better, not simply tax the economy more. The revenue strategy should engineer a cycle in which investment raises production, production creates jobs, jobs lift household incomes, incomes broaden the tax base, and a broader base delivers the domestic revenue that funds the next round of investment. Debt restructuring has already eased what taxes pay for, as our reporting on the Treasury’s fiscal space showed. The MTRS decides what they pay for next.

The goal is not to extract more from a small economy. It is to build a larger, more productive economy that generates more revenue by default. The consultations that opened on Thursday will be judged in 2031 on one distinction: whether the base grew, or merely the rates.

Related reading

• Zambia to Launch 2027-2031 Revenue Strategy Consultations on Thursday
• The Four Pillars of Zambia’s Revenue Strategy, and the Gap They Have to Close
• Budget 2027 Should Put Jobs and Productive Investment First
• Zambia Domestic Financing 2026: Treasury Targets 82% of National Budget
• From K70 to K15: How Debt Restructuring Changed What Zambia’s Taxes Pay For
• ZRA Smart Invoice: Why Your Supplier’s Compliance Is Now Your Problem
• Mapping the Copper FDI Pipeline: Vedanta, Mopani and First Quantum’s Zambian Bets
• Zambia MSME Enterprise Graduation Scheme
• The Mathematical Derivative of the Torah: A Zambian Tax Philosophy

WARNING! All rights reserved. This material and all other digital content on this website may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed, in whole or in part, without the prior express permission of The Zambian Economist. Where permission is granted, the content must be clearly credited to “The Zambian Economist,” with “www.zambianeconomist.com” prominently displayed.
WhatsApp: +260775574228 | Email: info@zambianeconomist.com
© 2026 The Zambian Economist.

Work With The Zambian Economist

• Advertise With Us
• List With Us
• Submit an Article

By The Zambian Economist Analyst | Lusaka | 1 September 2026

The Economics Association of Zambia should use the opening of President Hakainde Hichilema’s second term to offer government a formal five-year economic advisory compact. The proposal should begin with the Ministry of Finance and National Planning, then extend to the ministries whose decisions shape jobs, prices, production and public investment.

This is not a call for EAZ to become an appendage of State House. It is a call for Zambia’s organised economics profession to become more useful, more visible and harder to ignore.

The timing could scarcely be better. President Hichilema took the oath for a second term on 1 September. EAZ is due to hold its Annual General Meeting in Livingstone on 3 and 4 September, with elections for a new leadership on 4 September. Two mandates are beginning within days of each other. One is political. The other is professional.

EAZ should meet that moment with an institutional offer: let Zambia’s economists help government test policy before citizens pay for mistakes.

A professional body should meet a political term with an institutional offer

EAZ already has the mandate. Its constitution provides for participation in the development of sound economic policy, the publication of research and the provision of advisory services to the public and private sectors. Its stated vision is to become a centre of excellence for independent economic policy analysis.

The Association has also said it wants to play an advisory role to government. The next step is to turn that intention into a working arrangement with deliverables, deadlines and public accountability.

Zambia is moving from one planning cycle into another. The Eighth National Development Plan covers 2022 to 2026, while the new presidential term runs to 2031. The Government has already opened work around a 2027 to 2031 Medium-Term Revenue Strategy. Decisions made now will shape taxation, borrowing, public investment and the space available for social spending over most of the new term.

EAZ should not wait to be invited into isolated workshops after the main choices have been made. It should propose a standing channel through which government can request analysis, and through which the Association can submit advice on its own initiative.

What a five-year advisory compact should contain

The compact need not create another expensive bureaucracy. It should organise expertise that already exists in universities, banks, businesses, research institutes, civil society and the public service.

A quarterly national economic council

EAZ should convene a quarterly technical meeting with the Ministry of Finance and National Planning, the Bank of Zambia and relevant sector ministries. Each meeting should focus on one defined problem and end with a short public record of the evidence considered, areas of agreement and unresolved questions.

The agenda should move beyond commentary on inflation and the kwacha. It should examine the quality of public investment, the cost of tax incentives, farm productivity, mining linkages, electricity constraints, employment and the performance of state-owned enterprises.

Independent policy and budget notes

Before every national budget, EAZ should publish a costed submission that identifies trade-offs. After the budget, it should explain who gains, who pays and whether the numbers are consistent with the Government’s fiscal targets.

Major policy proposals should receive the same treatment. A new subsidy, tax concession or state investment should be tested against its full cost, its likely effect and credible alternatives. Government would remain free to decide. The public would be better able to judge the decision.

Technical groups embedded around real ministry problems

The Ministry of Finance and National Planning should be the anchor, not the only partner. EAZ should establish rotating technical groups for Agriculture, Mines, Energy, Commerce, Small and Medium Enterprise Development, Labour and other economic portfolios.

These groups could review programme design, help ministries improve economic modelling and connect public officers with specialists outside government. The work should be demand-led and time-bound. A ministry facing a question about fertiliser support, power pricing or local content should be able to request a team with the right skills, not a general conference.

A public scorecard for the new term

EAZ should publish an annual independent scorecard on a small set of measures that citizens and businesses can follow. The indicators should include real household income, formal employment, productivity, domestic arrears, public investment completion and export value added.

Targets should be drawn from official plans and budgets. Methods should be published. Where data are missing or disputed, EAZ should say so plainly.

A rapid-response economics panel

Floods, droughts, fuel shocks, power shortages and abrupt movements in commodity prices do not wait for annual conferences. EAZ needs a roster of members who can produce short, reviewed advice within days of a major shock. Government would gain an additional source of analysis. The public would gain a sober explanation at the moment confusion is highest.

An economist in State House still needs economists outside State House

President Hichilema holds a degree in economics and business administration and a master’s degree in finance and business strategy. That background should make a structured relationship with EAZ easier to build.

It should not make the Association less necessary.

Economic decisions are rarely defeated by a lack of intelligence at the top. They fail because assumptions go untested, officials work in silos, political incentives shorten the time horizon or inconvenient evidence reaches the room too late. A president trained in economics should understand the value of an organised body that can challenge forecasts before they become budgets and question projects before they become debt.

The best advice will sometimes confirm the Government’s course. At other times it will recommend delay, redesign or reversal. That is the point. An advisory body that only applauds is not advising.

EAZ should ask whether Hichilema could serve as honorary patron

EAZ should consult its membership and State House on whether President Hichilema could serve as honorary patron of the Association. His economics background and the timing of a new term make the question worth asking.

Patronage could raise the profile of the profession, help bring young economists into EAZ and signal that economic debate belongs in national life. It could also give the Association more convening power when it calls ministries, businesses and universities to the same table.

But the title must be designed with care. EAZ’s own membership terms describe it as non-political and non-partisan. An honorary patron should therefore have no power to appoint the leadership, approve research, block publication or direct the Association’s positions. The arrangement should require member approval, a legal and constitutional review, a written statement of independence and a clear route for EAZ to publish criticism of government.

If those protections cannot be secured, EAZ should pursue the advisory compact without presidential patronage. Access is useful. Independence is indispensable.

Cooperation must include the right to disagree

For government, the attraction of this compact is straightforward. It would widen the pool of expertise available to ministries and create an early warning system for weak policy design. It would also help officials explain difficult trade-offs with evidence from a body outside government.

For EAZ, the compact offers relevance. Zambia does not need a professional association that appears mainly at conferences and ceremonial dinners. It needs one that produces work people can quote, test and debate.

For citizens and businesses, the gain would be better scrutiny. A farmer should be able to see the economics behind an input-support change. A small manufacturer should be able to understand the cost of unreliable power. A taxpayer should be able to compare what a public project promised with what it delivered.

None of this works if EAZ exchanges independence for proximity. Its funding should be disclosed. Government commissions should be published where security and personal data do not prevent it. Research teams should declare conflicts of interest. Dissenting views should be recorded when members reach different conclusions.

The Association must remain willing to say that a popular policy is expensive, that a target is unrealistic or that an official forecast rests on weak assumptions. That candour would make cooperation more useful, not less.

Livingstone can mark a change in EAZ’s national role

The EAZ meeting on 3 and 4 September should produce more than a new list of office bearers. Candidates for the Association’s leadership should be asked whether they support a formal advisory compact, what safeguards they would place around presidential patronage and which public products they would deliver in their first year.

A credible first-year programme would be simple: sign a memorandum with the Ministry of Finance and National Planning, publish two independent policy briefs, launch the annual scorecard and convene the first ministry technical group. Put the dates in the public domain. Report progress to members every quarter.

President Hichilema has received a second five-year mandate. EAZ is about to choose the people who will speak for Zambia’s economics profession. The Association should pledge to work with government now, while making clear that partnership will never require permission to tell the truth.

Zambia needs a stronger economic advocacy body inside the national conversation. EAZ should volunteer for the job.

Sources and related reading

• Economics Association of Zambia: About Us
• EAZ 2026 elective EGM notice
• State House: President Hakainde Hichilema’s background
• Ministry of Finance and National Planning: Eighth National Development Plan
• Zambia After the Oath: The Economic and Diplomatic Tests of Hichilema’s Second Term
• Zambia to Launch 2027-2031 Revenue Strategy Consultations
• EAZ Seeks Formal Partnership With Finance Ministry as Musokotwane Calls for Practical Policy Ideas
• Macroeconomy and Policy coverage

WARNING! All rights reserved. This material and all other digital content on this website may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed, in whole or in part, without the prior express permission of The Zambian Economist. Where permission is granted, the content must be clearly credited to “The Zambian Economist,” with “www.zambianeconomist.com” prominently displayed.

WhatsApp: +260775574228 | Email: info@zambianeconomist.com
© 2026 The Zambian Economist.

Work With The Zambian Economist

• Advertise With Us
• List With Us
• Submit an Article