Stanbic Bank Hails Government on Strong Private Sector Growth

Stanbic Bank Crested Towers headquarters

 

HABARI DAILY I Kampala, Uganda I  Stanbic Bank, Uganda’s biggest commercial bank has hailed the Government about the sustained strong private sector growth, which has made local enterprises optimistic about the future.

Christopher Legilisho, a Senior Economist at Stanbic Bank said that the Purchasing Managers’ (PMI) Index data for December 2024 revealed Private sector business conditions expanded for the ninth consecutive month.

“This was due to strong sustained customer demand resulting in an expansion in output and new orders. This was despite a fall in employment for a second month in a row,” he said.

He said the growth in new orders occurred across the board, reflecting the acquisition of new clients and an improvement in consumer purchasing power.

“Consequently, there was an increase in backlogs during the month. Firms ramped up their purchasing activity and inventories to accommodate the strong demand orders,” he said, according to a recently issued press statement.

He said central to the latest strengthening in the health of the private sector were further increases in both output and new orders in December, in each case extending the current periods of expansion to nine months.

“Companies were reportedly successful in securing new customers, resulting in growth of new orders and feeding through to the expansion in output. Business activity increased across each of the five broad sectors covered by the survey,” Legilisho noted.

Stanbic Bank recently offered 100 vocational training scholarships to Youths in Eastern Uganda

 

He said local traders are upbeat that there will be a rise in customer numbers over the course of 2025, which has contributed to their confidence in the year ahead.

Legilisho said, “Input and output price pressures remained due to elevated utility bills, and increased purchase prices due to hikes to materials including timber, foodstuff and paper products.

He added that staffing costs were muted as increases in wages were largely netted off by the fall in employment.

“Despite sustained growth of output and new orders and confidence for the future, companies scaled back employment for the second month running at the end of the year. The fall in staffing levels often reflected the non- replacement of leavers.”

In contrast to the picture for staffing levels, purchasing activity rose and companies expanded their stocks of inputs.

“Efforts to secure inputs were helped by a shortening of suppliers’ delivery times as competition among vendors led them to deliver more quickly than in November. Higher prices for materials including foodstuff, paper products and timber fed through to a rise in purchase costs in December,” said Legilisho.

He added that output prices increased for the fourth consecutive month, whereby pushing up the charges in agriculture, industry and services, with a reduction in construction, wholesale and retail.

The Stanbic PMI is compiled by S&P Global from responses to questionnaires sent to purchasing managers of around 400 local private sector companies.

The sectors covered by the survey include agriculture, mining, manufacturing, construction, wholesale, retail and services.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *