A number of economic challenges in 2022, including a weakened external demand, high inflation rates, and tightening global financial conditions brought about a decline to the economic growth of the Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) region to 3.4%.
2022 marked a commercially turbulent year for Africa owing to domestic and international economic deterrents. Issues such as food and energy inflations were partly catalyzed by the Russia-Ukraine conflict taking place on the other side of the world.
The cost of living, food insecurity, energy scarcity and more became major crises in numerous regions across the continent, and experts seem to think that these complications may persist.
A number of global economic forecasts from world renowned economists or economic organizations has shown that the year 2023 may be marred by a global recession, a sentiment the World Bank seems to share.
An extract from the institution’s latest Global Economic Prospect report, which the World Bank notes is subject to frequent updates, reads, “growth in 2023-24 is projected to remain below long-term averages in several economies as cost-of-living increases and tighter policies continue to dent domestic demand. Subdued growth will make it difficult to reverse increases in food insecurity and poverty.”
In vastly rich countries like Angola, South Africa and Nigeria, the World Bank has projected that growth would decelerate to 2.8%, 1.4% and 2.9% respectively.
Regardless, the bank has also foreshadowed that elsewhere in the SSA region growth is estimated to strengthen to 5.0% on average in 2023-24, slightly below the June forecast, despite over 60% of countries in SSA already being in, or at high risk of debt distress.
The report further goes on to relay that Capital flows to SSA are expected to remain weak amid sharply increased credit risks, as soaring borrowing costs exacerbate debt sustainability concerns across the region.
With these nuances that both show that Africa could stay afloat despite the despondent forecasts, and maybe affected by the predicted global recession, it is evident that some countries in the region would fare better than others during the 2023 fiscal year, and according to the World Bank's report, some regions would actually experience a growth in their economy.
Save Mauritius, all the countries on this list have been projected to perform better, economically, in 2023 than they did last year.
On that note, below are the top ten SSA countries with the highest economic prospects for 2023 according to the World Bank:
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