Malawi's foreign aid in-flows expected to jump by 46%

LUSAKA, May 23 (Xinhua) -- Malawi's foreign aid in-flows are expected to jump by 46 percent from 71 billion in the fiscal year 2007/08 to (about 489.655 million U.S. dollars) 104 billion (about717 million dollars) in the 2008/09 financial year set to start on July 1 thanks to economy's impressive track record that has instilled confidence in the country's donor community.

In his 52-paged State of the Nation Address delivered during the opening of the 2008/09 Budget Sitting of Parliament in Lilongwe earlier this week entitled 'Malawi: A Nation of Achievers', President Bingu wa Mutharika said that since 2004 the country has regained the confidence from quite a good number of development partners who continue to express interest to pump their funds into the country's development buffer, according to website of The Nation newspaper of the country.

He said the development partners express such gestures because of a sustained satisfactory economic performance. "Government has continued to receive support from cooperating partners because of the confidence they have in us...""We have been running the Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) since 2005 and have gone through six reviews . We are, therefore, confident that the final review will go through paving way for a successor program," Mutharika said.