CAPE TOWN (Reuters) – Zambia’s economy is expected to grow by 3.7 percent this year, largely stable from last year and is seen expanding by more than four percent in 2017, the deputy finance minister said on Wednesday.

Christopher Mvunga also said the central bank had not intervened in the market to stabilise the struggling kwacha by selling dollars.

“We are not using reserves by any means to stabilise the kwacha, absolutely not,” Mvunga told Reuters in an interview at a mining conference in Cape Town.

The World Bank has said Zambia’s GDP growth will fall below 4 percent this year due to a combination of domestic and international pressures but expansion in Africa’s second-largest copper producer will pick up in subsequent years.

(Reporting by Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo; Editing by James Macharia)