Bolivia officially announces 3.5% GDP growth in 2022 and consolidates its economic recovery

Bolivia closed the 2022 management with a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth of 3.5 percent, which maintains stability to date and consolidates the return to the path of economic recovery with dozens of industrialization projects, confirmed the Government on Wednesday.

In separate statements to journalists, the Minister of Economy, Marcelo Montenegro, and the Vice-Minister of Budget and Fiscal Accounting, Zenón Mamani, evaluated Bolivia’s economic situation halfway through the administration of President Luis Arce’s government.

Montenegro said that the GDP indicator shows growth in economic activity after the adverse effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and the financial crisis, which was aggravated by the political turmoil during the interim administration of Jeanine Áñez.

He recalled that, during the interim government, Bolivian GDP declined by -8.8 percent.

In addition, he highlighted the nominal GDP growth that went from US$40.703 billion in 2021 to US$44.315 billion in 2022, the highest figure in Bolivian history.

For his part, Vice Minister Mamani emphasized that Bolivia returned to the path of economic growth with a 3.5 percent expansion and the lowest inflation in the region in 2022.

He pointed out that this is in addition to the low inflation the country is now registering. In 2022 this rate reached 3.12 percent, and as of the first quarter of this year, it gained -0.19 percent. “This situation demonstrates the stability of prices in the national economy,” he added.

“The 3.12 percent is the lowest inflation rate in the region and is one of the inflation rates in which international organizations have recognized that Bolivia has applied a policy that rightly takes care of the pocket of each of the citizens”, highlighted the vice minister.

In addition to these results, according to the Vice Minister, the unemployment rate has been reduced from 11.6 percent to 4.5 percent.

The fiscal deficit has been reduced from almost 13 percent in 2020 to 7.25 percent in 2022.

According to Mamani, the industrialization process will be consolidated in the second half of Arce’s administration.

He mentioned among the new factories the biodiesel, agro-inputs, fertilizer, zinc refining plants, the Mutún steel mill, the primary chemical industry, lithium, potato processing, Amazonian fruits, dairy, and meat products, among others.

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