DRC Congo: Economic Growth Set to Reach An Unprecedented Seven Percent in 2013 Governance roadblock to economic and human development

WASHINGTON, April 12, 2012/African Press Organization (APO)/ -- In its first detailed economic analysis in twenty-five years, the World Bank projects the economy of The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is set to grow at up to 7 percent annually for the next two years.

However, commodities remain important, both directly and indirectly as these sectors finance construction, trade and other activities. Over the medium term sustained growth and job creation will depend on the ability of the government to develop infrastructure, improve the business climate, boost the private sector and spur innovation.

Maintaining economic stability, the Bank says, is the best opportunity the country has had in more than a quarter of a century to return the country to economic prosperity and to help the central African nation to “turn the page in the history of the country's economic and human development.”

The Bank's new Country Economic Memorandum (CEM) titled Resilience of an African Giant: Boosting Growth and Development in the Democratic Republic of Congo released in Kinshasa today says enduring economic growth since the end of the war has yet to restore the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to peace and prosperity. As a percentage of growth (GDP), wholesale and retail (40%), agriculture (24%), mining (12%), construction (11%), and transport and communications (10%) have led the economic recovery. It appears that economic growth, notably in the agricultural sector,, was on average over 7 percent during 2007-10, more than double the officially reported three percent.

World Bank economists note that after its long running civil war (1994-2002), economic growth averaged some 5.8 percent a year during 2002-10. By 2007, after five years of growth, the economy had returned to prewar (1994) levels, but the population was by then almost 50 percent larger than in 1994.