Digital transformation is rapidly reshaping economies and labor markets worldwide, creating new opportunities while demanding a workforce equipped with relevant digital competencies. For Zambia, a country with one of the youngest populations in the world—this transformation presents both...

Despite external and domestic shocks, Zambia has corrected macroeconomic imbalances, reached agreement on most of the external debt under the perimeter of the debt restructuring, and undertaken sustained fiscal consolidation while safeguarding social spending. Economic activity has expanded in...

Zambia, an economy heavily reliant on hydropower for electricity, has faced sustained disruptions to electricity generation amid increasingly frequent and severe droughts. These drought-related disruptions have caused large GDP losses in recent years and have tilted electricity generation...

Die Diversifizierung der Versorgung mit mineralischen Rohstoffen ist eine strategische Notwendigkeit. Dabei spielen rohstoffreiche Länder des Globalen Südens eine entscheidende Rolle. Sambia, ein wichtiger weltweiter Kupferexporteur mit weiteren kritischen Rohstoffen, sucht langfristige...

Zambia has high rates of violence against children in and low rates of secondary school completion, especially among girls.ii In 2023, the Keeping Girls in School (KGS) program under the Girls' Education and Women's Empowerment and Livelihoods (GEWEL) project, launched the Empowerment Pilot...

School-related gender-based violence remains widespread in low- and middle-income countries, yet rigorous evidence on effective prevention strategies is limited. This study evaluates the Empowerment Pilot, a multi-component program designed to address school-related gender-based violence in...

The government-implemented Supporting Women’s Livelihoods (SWL) intervention yielded large and lasting improvements in welfare outcomes for extremely poor women in Zambia. The SWL intervention aims to enhance women’s livelihoods and economic resilience by providing poor rural women with a...

Unregulated or weakly regulated financial institutions remain important providers of financial services across Sub-Saharan Africa. This study examines how such institutions operate in South Africa and Zambia, which represent contrasting regulatory approaches-restrictive and enabling,...

This paper shows that bargaining over tax payments is an important feature of tax compliance and enforcement in lower income countries. Analyzing the universe of administrative tax filings from Zambia, we document sharp bunching in (i) dominated regions above tax schedule discontinuities,...

Effective cash management is essential for enhancing fiscal discipline in Zambia, yet it faces significant challenges. With programmatic capacity development support from the IMF the authorities are making progress in improving institutional arrangements and strengthening capacity and technical...

The study examines changes in household food security and identifies their key determinants in Zambia by comparing the pre-pandemic period to the COVID-19 pandemic period. Using nationally representative surveys from 2015 and 2021 and the coarsened exact matching (CEM) approach, 8650 households...

This study examines the five-year impacts of a bicycle distribution program for adolescent girls in rural Zambia, implemented across 91 schools as part of a randomized controlled trial. While the program increased girls’ self-reported empowerment and reduced experiences of domestic and...

This report discusses the findings and recommendations of the 2024 assessment of the data quality of the public sector debt statistics (PSDS) of the Republic of Zambia against the IMF's Data Quality Assessment Framework (DQAF) for PSDS. The assessment was undertaken as part of a project to...

Zambia aspires to be a prosperous middle-income country by 2030. To that end, the Government of the Republic of Zambia (GRZ) has set out an aggressive economic diversification and industrialization agenda driven by the agriculture, mining, manufacturing, and tourism sectors. With regards to...

Diversifying the supply of mineral resources is a strategic necessity - one in which resource-rich countries of the Global South play a crucial role. Zambia, which is a major global copper exporter and possesses other critical raw materials, is seeking long-term alliances that will mobilise...

This study examines the five-year impacts of a bicycle distribution program for adolescent girls in rural Zambia, implemented across 91 schools as part of a randomized controlled trial. While the program increased girls' self-reported empowerment and reduced experiences of domestic and intimate...

Die Diversifizierung der Versorgung mit mineralischen Rohstoffen ist eine strategische Notwendigkeit. Dabei spielen rohstoffreiche Länder des Globalen Südens eine ent­scheidende Rolle. Sambia, ein wichtiger weltweiter Kupferexporteur mit weiteren kritischen Rohstoffen, sucht langfristige...

Zambia's economy is emerging from a debt crisis and has successfully negotiated a debt restructuring with creditors and an International Monetary Fund (IMF) program. This report highlights that, with reforms, significant profitable investment opportunities are available for businesses, which...

Zambia is simultaneously amongst the poorest and the most unequal countries in the world. In 2022, 64.3 percent of the population - about 12.6 million individuals - was living on less than US$2.15 a day. This level is not only the 6th highest in the world but it is also misaligned with the...

The Country Opinion Survey in Zambia assists the World Bank Group (WBG) in better understanding how stakeholders in Zambia perceive the WBG. It provides the WBG with systematic feedback from national and local governments, multilateral/bilateral agencies, media, academia, the private sector, and...

The fifth review of the trade policies and practices of Zambia takes place on 23 and 25 September 2025. The basis for the review is a report by the WTO Secretariat and a report by the Government of Zambia.

Zambia faces growing challenges from climate-related natural disasters, particularly floods and droughts, which have become more frequent and severe in recent years. These events disproportionately affect the country’s large agricultural sector—especially vulnerable subsistence farmers—and...

Firm growth in Zambia remains subdued, undermining the country’s potential to create jobs, raise productivity, and drive economic transformation. Formal businesses face persistent barriers—most notably limited access to finance, unreliable electricity supply, and competition from a large...

This Selected Issues paper examines how various constraints affect firm performance and contribute to Zambia’s low rate of new business formation. Unlocking Zambia’s firm growth potential requires decisive policy action to address long-standing structural constraints. This paper’s findings...

This paper presents Zambia’s 2025 Article IV Consultation, Fifth Review under the Extended Credit Facility Arrangement, and Financing Assurances Review. Program performance has remained broadly satisfactory. All end-December 2024 quantitative performance criteria and most indicative targets...