Kenya to stagnate regional economic growth rates.

(From Panafrican News Agency (PANA) Daily Newswire)

Nairobi, Kenya (PANA) - Kenya's economy is expected to stagnate at 2.3 percent for the rest of the year, compared to Uganda's 6.0 percent recorded earlier in the year, due to spiralling inflation, says the latest economic focus.

Kenya's economy will stagnate due to what economists attribute to a weakening currency against the major world currencies and the adverse effects of the spiralling world crude oil prices, the AIG Global Investment Group has said here.

An analysis of the economies in the region show that "speculative tendencies about Kenya's political and economic climate" have already had adverse effects on the shilling as wildcat inflation, resulting from the rise in global oil prices, have pushed the country's import bill by 30 percent.

The survey by AIG Global Investment Group, a firm of property and stock markets managers, says Kenya's economic gloom, fuelled by a recurrent drought, the delay in donor aid disbursements and the slackening anti-graft fight, will see the shilling weaken further while pushing the interest rates higher.

The survey focuses gloomy economic times ahead for most Kenyans, who are grappling with higher food prices, which have been skyrocketing, also pushing the inflationary trends to 10-year highs of 18.9 percent, partly due to the rise in electric power costs, food prices due to draughts and the high cost of transport.