Business & Markets · Credit to private sector · Botswana
Botswana’s credit to private sector rose to 33.2% of GDP in 2025.
33.2% of GDP
2025
Up 0.1 pp from 2024.
Updated 8 Oct 2026
In plain words
33.2% of GDP
What it is. This measure adds up the loans and other claims that banks and other financial institutions hold against households and private firms, then divides the total by the value of the country's annual output. It shows how much private borrowing the economy carries relative to its size. Credit to the government is excluded, and so are loans made directly by foreign lenders.
Neither way is good in itself. A higher share means households and businesses have more borrowed funds to spend and invest, and also more debt to service. A lower share means less borrowing pressure and less outside funding for growth. The latest figure is 33.2% of GDP for 2025, against 33.1% of GDP a year earlier, a rise of 0.1 percentage points. Since 2016 the range runs from a low of 29.9% of GDP in 2022 to a high of 39.7% of GDP in 2020, so the latest reading sits in the lower half of that range.
Why it matters. At 33.2% of GDP, private credit in Botswana is a sizeable but moderate part of the economy. Households and firms that borrow from banks are carrying roughly the same load relative to national output as a year earlier. Lenders have neither expanded sharply towards the 2020 peak nor pulled back to the 2022 low.
| Period | Credit to private sector · Botswana |
|---|---|
| 2016 | 32.7% of GDP |
| 2017 | 34% of GDP |
| 2018 | 34.7% of GDP |
| 2019 | 35.9% of GDP |
| 2020 | 39.7% of GDP |
| 2021 | 34.5% of GDP |
| 2022 | 29.9% of GDP |
| 2023 | 30.1% of GDP |
| 2024 | 33.1% of GDP |
| 2025 | 33.2% of GDP |
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0) · Licence: CC BY 4.0
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Strata-AF™ Data, Credit to private sector, Botswana, 2025; source World Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0), retrieved 8 Oct 2026; https://data.strata-af.com/business/private-sector-credit/botswana
Data insights · Worked out from the published figures
What this means
Working this out from the published figures…
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Methodology
Domestic credit to the private sector as a share of GDP. Unit: % of GDP.
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators (series FS.AST.PRVT.GD.ZS), retrieved through the World Bank API and published under CC BY 4.0. Updated annually; the World Bank's own source notes apply.