Developments in the second half of 2017 indicate that the slowdown in Mozambique's economic performance may be taking hold, shifting this once fast-growing economy to a more modest pace of growth. GDP growth is expected to dip to 3.1 percent in 2017, despite substantial increases in coal and aluminum exports. Whilst these exports boomed, small and medium enterprises (SMEs)have fallen back even further, especially in the manufacturing sector, which contracted for this first time since 1994. Current trends make it clear that Mozambique needs to redouble its efforts to support small and medium enterprises, and to look beyond the extractive sector for more balanced growth. The drift towards a natural resource extraction based economy with low employment generation makes the case for Mozambique to leverage off its growing and youthful population provides for future growth.