Namibia's central bank governor Johannes Gawaxab has warned that vaccine hesitancy and trivializing COVID-19 can be disastrous to the country's economy which is expected to recover gradually in 2021 by 1.4 percent and improve to a 3.4 percent growth rate in 2022.

Speaking at a public lecture on Friday evening, Gawaxab said stepping up of vaccination is a crucial element of reviving the economy, adding that if the southwest African nation does not get this right, restrictions would continue while the economy would continue struggling.

"The first thing we need to do as a nation is around vaccine diagnostics and now for the first time we have adequate supply and we cannot complain that we do not have that. Aggressive vaccine rollout is the only way to bring tourists back and revive the economy," he said.

About 8 percent of Namibia's population have been fully vaccinated, according to the health ministry's statistics.