Organized People’s Party (OPP) President Dr. Brian Mushimba has unveiled an economic recovery plan promising over 4 million jobs in five years.
The 2026 Presidential candidate observed that previous governments have failed to solve Zambia’s deepening poverty and unemployment.
Addressing the nation, Dr. Mushimba noted that most Zambians are now “reduced to surviving on just one meal a day” due to among others, high unemployment, soaring costs of living, low wages, and struggling small businesses.
He pledged the OPP would deliver “practical solutions effectively and permanently.”
Dr. Mushimba said his plan is anchored on four pillars, that includes an agricultural revolution, saying the OPP will establish a regional development bank in every province to finance maize, cotton, cattle, soya beans, and other strategic crops at commercial scale.
Dr. Mushimba stated that recruiting 10,000 medium-scale maize farmers alone would create 500,000 jobs from day one.
He also disclosed that an industrial development bank will finance Zambian businesses in mining, manufacturing, and tourism.
He cited cotton as a key example: with Mulungushi Textiles reopened, supporting 500,000 small-scale cotton farmers could produce 1 million tons in three years and generate 2.4 million jobs from lint processing alone.
Meanwhile, Dr. Mushimba said, through government funding, 1 million in-calf heifers will be distributed to farmers for a national beef value chain, creating 200,000 jobs before factoring in leather and other by-products.
He added that the fourth pillar on his recovery plan covers a creative economy fund for film, music, and the arts, and free Science & Technology Hubs to drive innovation.
