Treasury has tightened its belt and while wages, including bonuses, and essential support such as the food allocations are maintained, spending limits for other work has been imposed on ministries, departments and agencies for November and December due to limited fiscal space.
Government workers are receiving annual bonuses, and Treasury is putting essential expenses like addressing food shortages and financing agriculture support in 2024-2025 first.
A circular, sent to Permanent Secretaries and the Clerk of Parliament dated November 13, warns that non-wage Budget support will be restricted during this period.
Finance, Economic Development and Investment Promotion Permanent Secretary Mr George Guvamatanga urged Government agencies to be mindful of their expenses and make them a priority.
"As you may be aware, the local currency unit (ZWG) recently depreciated by 43 percent against the United States dollar, resulting in a substantial mismatch between revenue inflows, collected in some cases with a one-month lag and local currency expenditures that immediately adjusted to the new exchange rate, in the process severely constraining fiscal space for the last quarter of 2024," wrote Mr Guvamatanga.
He said the imbalance was further exacerbated by a backdated salary review award in October 2024 to the civil service.
"Given the consequent limited fiscal space and the need to mobilise additional resources to fund critical inescapable expenditures that include the 2024 bonus award, food deficit mitigation support, 2024-2025 agriculture input support, and utilities among other critical requirements, Treasury wishes to advise that non-wage budget support for the months of November and December 2024 will be severely constrained.
"Ministries, departments and agencies are, therefore, requested to prioritise their expenditure commitments during this period," said Mr Guvamatanga.
To support the prioritisation programme, Treasury will be implementing a number of complementary expenditure containment measures for the remainder of the present fiscal year, which include prioritising payment of outstanding unfunded payment runs.
"Treasury concurrence for foreign travels shall only be granted where funding is provided by agencies other than Government, local authorities and State-owned enterprises," he said.
"Local workshops are henceforth deferred with the exception of those granted prior approval by Treasury," he said. Treasury would rationalise fuel operational requirements by 50 percent.
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Already, the Government is seized with the second blitz of its food distribution programme to ensure no one dies of hunger as the country fights the effects of the El-Nino-induced drought.
A cumulative total of 94 527,64 tonnes had been moved across the country out of the expected 139 854,94 tonnes of cereal, which translates to 62,7 percent coverage, according to official statistics.
The grain is being distributed to vulnerable and food-insecure people across the country's provinces and President Mnangagwa has repeatedly said no Zimbabwean will be lost due to hunger.
As part of preparations for the summer cropping season, the Second Republic has pulled all stops to accelerate the distribution of inputs across provinces while farmers grapple with planting as some finalise land preparation under the Pfumvudza/Intwasa programme, which is meant to ensure the country achieves a bumper harvest.
Coming out of a devastating El-Nino-induced drought in the last season, Zimbabwe has set a target of reaching 3,5 million rural and peri-urban households under this year's Pfumvudza/Intwasa programme with inputs allocation being guided by ecological regional patterns.
To ease the workload on farmers, especially the elderly, the Government is encouraging the adoption of mechanised Pfumvudza/Intwasa, which requires less manual labour than traditional methods.
In drier areas, the farmers are given two 50kg bags of Compound D and top dressing fertiliser, 5kg of sorghum seeds, 2kg cow peas, 2kg sunflower seeds and a pack of horticultural pack, which contain tomato seeds, onions, leafy vegetables and a choice of butternut, carrots or beetroot.
