- Financing to the productive sector is small
The configuration of credit distribution in the economy highlights the need for the country to further deepen its productive roots.
Bank credit is an important financial instrument for the financing of consumer and investment activities by economic agents and, therefore, in the promotion of economic growth, in a dynamic that ensures that existing resources are channeled to the most productive sectors of the economy.
Analysing the distribution of credit by sectors of the Covid-19 credit lines, the CEO of Banco Nacional de Investimentos – BNI, Tomás Matola, notes that the predominance of the trade sector in the absorption of credit made available in this context, particularly, raises concerns about the productive structure of our economy.
Data revealed by BNI, on the absorption of Covid-19 credit lines, show that, in the distribution of credit by sectors, trade leads with 29%, followed by poultry and livestock 16% and the tourism sector 9%. Analyzing this configuration, Tomás Matola, inferred that it is an undesirable situation, inasmuch as, although it is important in the promotion of economic activity, in the case of Mozambique, the trade sector has a limited contribution in the generation of goods in the economy, transacting mostly imported goods.
The position of commerce as one of the main recipients of bank credit is not an isolated event in the COVID-19 credit lines, on the contrary, it reflects the economic reality of the country in general. Data from the Bank of Mozambique show that trade, together with the sectors of Industry and Transport and Communications, are the main recipients of financial resources channeled by the banking sector.
In 2020 alone, the industry received 17% of the credit made available, followed by Commerce (11%) and Transport & Communications (10%). One aspect that deserves attention is the financing of agriculture, which is still quite incipient, receiving, on average, only 4% of the financing.
Furthermore, most bank credit goes to non-productive areas (housing and consumption), on average, 25% of the economy’s credit is used to finance these areas.
Source: Seminário Económico