Namibia's economy has expanded in the third quarter to 7.2%, compared to 5.4% in the corresponding period last year.
The growth is attributed to the mining and quarrying sector, which posted a phenomenal 51.7% growth in real added value.
This is revealed in the third quarter report of the Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA).
The highest revision of the third quarter was mining and quarrying, which recorded a robust growth of 20.3 percentage points, surpassing the 30.6% growth during the same period in 2022.
The upsurge is due to sustained investment in mineral exploration, uranium mining, and mining and metal ores.
The mining exploration subsector recorded a staggeing 315.8% increase in real value, following a substantial growth of 354.4% in the third quarter last year, the NSA quarterly report observed.
The metal ores recorded double-digit growth of 33.4%, compared to a decline of 22.6% in the corresponding period last year.
The report said the performance of the subsector is attributed to an increase in gold production.
The Agriculture and Forestry sector also rebounded to a record growth of 19.9% as a result of recovery in the livestock sector, posting a growth of 25.6%.
This comes on the back of robust slaughtering activities at abattoirs for cattle, which rose by 55.5%.
The report further said the number of cattle exported on the hoof increased by 45.6%.
Also, the number of small stocks exported live increased by 60.8%.
The number of small stocks marketed to export-approved abattoirs increased by 11.2%, which is a slowdown from the strong growth of 28.1% recorded in the third quarter of 2022.
The report said the year-on-year gross domestic product in the third quarter stood at N$38.7 billion compared to N$31.1 billion, showing an expansion of N$2.6 billion.
However, the secondary industry slumped to a growth of 8.5% due to contractions of 8.7% and 30.6% in the manufacturing and construction sectors, respectively.
The report also observed that consumption expenditure by households posted a low growth of 1.3% in comparison to the 23% recorded in the corresponding period last year.
According to the NSA report, this shows that households are maintaining a cautionary approach to the consumption of goods and services.