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Financial and technology sectors are the least optimistic sectors about business growth in Kenya despite a strong overall economic growth confidence ahead of tomorrow’s polls, Kenya’s private sector Business Confidence Index 2022 shows.

The Index report by Kenya Private Sector Alliance (Kepsa) shows that finance and IT sectors are confident with 58 index points, below an overall confidence of 61 points on average. The Hospitality and Tourism sectors are the most hopeful at 68 index points, followed by construction and retail sectors at 62 points each.

Agriculture and manufacturing sectors expressed 60 index points confidence. The survey, which collected views of 173 business executives from small, medium and large companies, averaged confidence on three indicators – current economic conditions, expectations of the general economy, and own industry expectations.

The low optimism in the financial and IT sectors is linked to the boom they experienced when Covid struck and are not expecting much change unlike other sectors such as tourism which were hardest hit and is on a recovery path.

“Businesses in these sectors were already experiencing positive growth relative to other sectors even at the height of Covid-19 Pandemic and do not expect much to change for them in the coming six months,” Kepsa CEO Carol Kariuki said during the release of the report.