Rutendo Mawere
17 October 2009
Gweru — Zimbabwean Industries will not reach the targeted 60% capacity utilization by the end of the year as planned by the inclusive government in the Short Term Emergency Recovery Program (STERP). The Minister of Industry and Trade, Professor Welshman Ncube said that his ministry had carried out its own assessments and realised that the 60% target was far fetched.
"We will not be able to reach the target average of 60%, at the moment the productive sector capacity utilization stands at 35%," Ncube said on Friday in Gweru where he was guest of honour at the Launch of the Centre for Entrepreneurship Development Studies at the Midlands Sate University.
Ncube said the inclusive government was facing major challenges in trying to resuscitate the productive sector that had collapsed over the last decade.
He said the biggest disappointment that they were facing in trying to make the economy work again was the letdown by international banks which he criticised for only offering 3% of their deposits for lending, an act he described as "criminal".
"The ratio that international banks including Standard, Barclays and Stanbic are lending to business is criminal. We name them openly in the hope that they will think hard.
They have decided to sit on the money that after all does not belong to them but to Zimbabweans," Ncube said.
He said other challenges included the debts from arbitrary conversion from the local currency to the US dollar, power and transport and also the fact that the money secured by Zimbabwe for example from Comesa is expensive money and has a lot of bureaucratic requirements delaying accessibility just like the credit lines offered by other Sadc members .
Ncube also said that sanctions were contributing to the economic problems that the country is still trying to weather.
Ncube acknowledged that Zimbabweans at the moment including government fail to appreciate the real value of the dollar and are charging unrealistic tariffs that have a knock on effect on the resuscitation of the productive sector.
Turning to the issue of reintroduction of the Zimbabwe dollar Ncube said: "Reintroducing the Zimbabwe dollar is tantamount to committing economic suicide.
At cabinet level we have agreed that the Zimbabwe dollar is not an option. The real debate that can be pondered on is whether Zimbabwe should maintain the use of multicurrency or to join the Rand Monetary Union so that we can be able to get the rand printed specifically for Zimbabwe so that we have more money in circulation and people can buy from the productive sector, otherwise what we produce will be destined for the warehouse."
Ncube also condemned reckless decisions by some individuals whom he accused of trying to undermine the desire to stabilise the country.
Ncube said the re-incarceration of Roy Bennett, Deputy Minister of Agriculture designate, had a potential to cause a political crisis.
"The AG's office should be sensitive to the fragile political environment and decisions should not be made recklessly. Their act calls into question the continued participation of some political parties in the inclusive government.
"There are people driven with a desire to undermine political stability. Do you think that the incarceration of Bennett is so important that we can risk the entire collapse of the inclusive government and what it has achieved so far?"
Ncube blamed the AG's office for not treading carefully and said even if they had to prosecute they could have done it sensitively.
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