Country Summary -- Zambia

Zambia

Country Profile



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General

The South Africa Company administered the territory of Northern Rhodesia from 1891 until it was taken over by the UK in 1923. During the 1920s and 1930s, advances in mining spurred development and immigration. The name was changed to Zambia upon independence in 1964. In the 1980s and 1990s, declining copper prices and a prolonged drought hurt the economy.

Zambia is a landlocked country in Southern Africa that borders Mozambique, Zimbabwe Tanzania, Malawi, Angola, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Namibia. Its border with Zimbabwe is a natural border, with the Zambezi River forming the boundary between the two countries

Zambia is comprised of a variety of ethnic groups. The majority of the population is African at 98.7%. European comprise 1.1% while the other groups comprise 0.2%. There are two main religious groups in Zambia, the first being Christians at 50%-75%, and the second being Muslim and Hindu 24%-49%, with indigenous beliefs at 1%. Even though English if the official language of Zambia, major indigenous vernaculars such as Bemba, Kaonda, Lozi, Lunda, Luvale, Nyanja, Tonga, and about 70 other indigenous languages are still spoken daily.

Zambia gained its independence in October 1964 from the United Kingdom (UK). It legal system is based on English common law and customary law with judicial review of legislative acts in an ad hoc constitutional council. Elections in 1991 brought an end to one-party rule, but the subsequent vote in 1996 saw blatant harassment of opposition parties. In 2001, Zambia held elections that were marked by administrative problems with at least two parties filing legal petitions challenging the results. The elections resulted in Levy M. Wasa assuming the presidency as well as becoming Head of State, with Eroch Kavindele becoming vice president. The president appoints the vice president as well as the members of the Cabinet. The members of the Cabinet are chosen out of the National Assembly, which is a body of the government that represents popular elected delegates from various areas of the country representing the people. Opposition parties currently hold a majority of seats in the National Assembly.

The Legal System is also comprised of people appointed by the president to these positions. In the Supreme Court, the president appoints the justices/judges. Something unique to the Zambian judicial system is that in Zambia, the High Court has unlimited jurisdiction to hear civil and criminal cases.

Zambia contains many natural resources such as copper, cobalt, zinc, lead, coal, emeralds, gold, silver, uranium, and hydropower. However, despite progress in privatization and budgetary reform, Zambia's economy has a long way to go. Privatization of government-owned copper mines relieved the government from covering mammoth losses generated by the industry and greatly improved the chances for copper mining to return to profitability and spur economic growth. However, low mineral prices have slowed the benefits from privatizing the mines and reduced incentives for further private investment in the sector. In late 2000, Zambia was determined to be eligible for debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative, but Zambia has not yet finalized its Poverty Reduction Strategy paper. Unemployment rates remain high, but GDP growth should continue at about 4%. Inflation should remain close to 20%. Agriculture and industry are the main components and employers of the Zambian economy, comprising more than 50% of each case.

Other problems faced by Zambia is the fact that Zambia is a transshipment point for moderate amounts of methaqualone, small amounts of heroin, and cocaine bound for Southern Africa and possibly Europe. Another problem that hinders growth in Zambia is a poorly developed financial infrastructure coupled with a government commitment to combating money laundering make it an unattractive venue for money launderers. Another problem that faces the majority of the population is unemployment because the rate increases and is already at 50% today. Other issues that face Zambia are increasing number of refugees that inundate the country from surrounding war-torn countries. Also, mismanagement and destruction of the natural resources as well as corruption by the government have also hurt Zambia tremendously. All of these factors coupled together have had devastating affects for the general health and well being of the population.

Education

Zambia’s education system is doing moderately well, with a literacy rate of 78.9% for the entire process. This level entails the female literacy rate (72.6%) and the male literacy rate (85.7%). Another more than 89% of the young females and 84% of the young males in Zambia are enrolled in gross primary school. This number drops dramatically for secondary school, with 30% of the females and 23% of the males attending this level of school. This drop in enrollment rates could be attributed to the lack of government spending on education, since the government allots only 2% of its budget to education.

Health

Zambia contains a majority young population, with 47% of the population between 0-14, and 50.4% of the population is 15-64, with only a little over 2% of the population over 65. The life expectancy for Zambia is extremely low, at only 37.35 years for the entire population. As a result, the life expectancy for females is only 37.66 years and only 37.05 years for males. More than 86% of the population are living in poverty, and more than 68% of the population has access to improved water and 74% have access to improved sanitation. However, the government still faces a lack of adequate water treatment facilities, and this presents various human health risks. Another health risk that concerns the population in Zambia deals with the AIDS epidemic. Many estimates for Zambia state that they have explicitly taken into account the effects of excess mortality due to AIDS. This can result in lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality and death rates, lower population and growth rates, and changes in the distribution of population by age and sex than would otherwise be expected (July 2002 est.). Currently in Zambia, the adult prevalence rate for HIV/AIDS is 19.95% (1999 est.) which means that the population living with AIDS exceeds 870,000 people. The AIDS epidemic as well as other environmental problems such as air pollution and resulting acid rain in the mineral extraction and refining region; chemical runoff into watersheds; poaching seriously threatens rhinoceros, elephant, antelope, and large cat populations; deforestation continue to inhibit Zambia’s progress into the future.

Food & Diet

The difficulties that face Zambia when focusing on nutrition deals with the lack of food that are available. This is another result of the civil war as well as soil erosion and desertification. Due to these as well as other factors, the amount of agriculture produced by Zambia dropped significantly. This resulted in less food total, and since the agriculture business was both a big employer as well as a food source, the decrease in amount of agricultural product affected how much the population ate and brought in as work. This is due to the fact that vegetables and other agricultural products are a big part of the diet, so a decrease in agriculture affected the population a lot. Almost 1.901 kcal per day is consumed in the diet, with1.805 kcal coming from vegetable products and only .096 kcal coming from animal sources. Within the vegetables consumed by the population, maize and starchy roots such as cassava are the main staples in the diet. Another nutritional fact is that a significant number of populations consume alcoholic beverages. Using this fact in conjunction with the decrease in the amount of food could lead to serious health and nutritional issues for the population affected by this statistic.

Indicators

Population	1991	1995	1999	2002
Total	8,068,473	8,826,688	9,589,774	10,148,674
< 5 years	1,529,802	1,629,278	1,715,895	1,755,205
5-14 years	2,362,555	2,598,625	2,815,487	2,970,776
> 14 years	4,176,116	4,598,785	5,058,392	5,422,693
Population Growth Rate	1980-90		1990-2002
	Not reported		1.9
TFR (Total Fertility Rate)	1991		2002
	5.9		5.43
Under- five Mortality Rate	1991		2002
	191		186
IMR (Infant Mortality Rate)	1991		2002
	107		115
MMR (deaths per 100,000 live births)	1985-1995 870
% Pregnant Women Immunized against Tetanus	1998
	Not reported
DPT Immunization (% < 12 mths)	2000
	84
Measles Immunization (% < 12mths)	2000 90
*Economic*
GDP (US $ billions)	1980-90		2000
	Not reported		Not reported
GNP per capita at PPP	2000
	300
GNP annual growth rate	1998-99
	Not reported

% Below Poverty Line ($1/day)	2002
	63.7
Public Expenditure on Health (% of GDP)	1996
	Not reported


Public Expenditure on Education (% of GDP)	1990-1998
	2
*Education*	1991	1995	1999	2002
Literacy pop. over 15
Females	41.3	34.9	Not reported	28.5
Males	21.4	18.0	Not reported	14.8
Gross Primary School Enrollment (% of age group)
Females	95	86	Not reported	84
Males	92	91	Not reported	89
Gross Secondary School Enrollment (% of age group)
Females	18	20	Not reported	23
Males	30	33	Not reported	30
*Health and Nutrition*
% of Births Attended	2000
	47
% Pop. Access Improved Sanitation	2002
	74
% Pop. Access Improved Water	2002
	68
% Pop. living with HIV/AIDS, (age 15 -49)	1995
	Not reported
Weight/Age (% less than –2 z-score)	24
Height/Age (% less than –2 z-score)	42.4
Median Duration Breastfeeding	Not reported
Food and Dietary Indices	1990	1995	1999	2002
Total Calories Consumed (kcals/day)
Animal Sources of food (kcals/day)

Sources

1. http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idbpyr.html

2. http://www.worldbank.org/poverty/wdrpoverty/report/

3. http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html

4. http://apps.fao.org/page/collections?subset=nutrition

5. http://genderstats.worldbank.org

6. http://www.undp.org/hdr2002/indicator/

7. http://www.paho.org

8. Europa World Year Book 2001, 42^nd edition, 1^st volume

Population

GNP per capita at PPP