Gvt to pay infrastructural project contractors half in forex, half Zimdollar to curb speculative tendencies, Finance Minister

Image: The Sunday Mail

The Minister of Finance Mthuli Ncube says the government has put in place measures to prevent its infrastructural project contractors from driving the forex parallel market.

The contractors are accused of driving currency volatility and instability by sourcing foreign currency from the parallel market.

Ncube told a post-cabinet Press briefing that a ‘liquidity committee’ has been instituted comprising Treasury and central bank officials, and that committee is ensuring that: Contractors are paid by government 50% in forex and 50% in Zimdollar.

He said the ZW$ payment is will be smoothed out over a period and not in one lump sum.

Meanwhile, cabinet has considered and approved the exemption of Hwange Electricity Supply Company (HESCO) to enter into long term coal supply agreements under the Hwange Expansion Power Project.

The Ministry of Information told the same press briefing that the government has embarked on various infrastructural projects to underpin the transformation of the country’s productive capacities.

The middle noted that one such landmark project is the Hwange Expansion Power Project, which is expected to significantly contribute towards the re-vitalisation of the agricultural industrial, manufacturing and mining sectors.

On completion, the project is expected to contribute an additional 600MW to the national grid.

Apparently, cabinet informed the nation that in line with the National Development Strategy (NDS1 2021-2025), Government undertook to develop the Tourism Satellite Account (TSA) in order to improve the accounting of the performance of the Tourism Sector.

A Technical Working group led by the Zimbabwe National Statistical Agency (ZIMSTAT) produced the TSA.

Currently tourism is contributing US$1 964 592 880 (4.5%) to Gross Domestic Product and government says there is need to triple growth in the sector to reach the target set of a US$5 billion tourism economy by 2025; -the Tourism Sector directly employed 99 141 people in 2018;

Meanwhile, domestic tourism contributed US$765 724 073 compared to US$1 198 868 807 inbound tourism expenditure & should be supported.

A call has been made for collaboration among government agencies involved in collection of tourism statistics, data collection.

The ministry of Information noted that at most collaboration will be strengthened by utilisation of digital platforms & will be enhanced among the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority, Department of Immigration & other State Actors.

Zwnews