The costs of corruption to the Mozambican economy. Why it is important to fight corruption in a climate of fiscal fragility

Abstract

What is the price that Mozambique has to pay for the widespread corruption in the country? What is the cost of corruption for the Mozambican economy, the state and its people? The present study aims at providing succinct answers to those questions.

In a nutshell: the estimated average annual cost of corruption, as observed during the ten years from 2004 to 2014, is up to 4.9 billion US $, equivalent to around 30% of the 2014 GDP and 60% of the 2015 budget. This burden caused by corruption is certainly crippling for the budget, the economy, business and socio-economic development and welfare.

The present study is the result of five months’ worth of intensive work of a study team composed of researchers and staff of both Centro de Integridade Pública (CIP) Maputo/Mozambique (www.cip.org.mz), and the Chr. Michelsen Institute (CMI), Bergen/Norway (www.cmi.no), the latter operating the U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre (www.U4.no). It is hoped that this study, launched on the 9th of December 2015, the International Anti-Corruption Day – an occasion which also marks the 10th anniversary of CIP – provokes the necessary and wide debate on the causes and implications of corruption in Mozambique and ways to curbing it and thus easing its burden on state, economy and society.