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VP Emmerson Mnangagwa

Farirai Machivenyika in Johannesburg, South Africa
Zimbabwe has abundant investment opportunities cutting across various sectors of the economy and is working on policies to improve business conditions for investors.

This was said by Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa, while officially opening the Zimbabwe-South Africa (ZIMSA) Investment Conference in Johannesburg, South Africa yesterday.

“In order to adequately exploit investment opportunities in Zimbabwe, Government is implementing various reforms across the entire public sector to improve the ‘Ease of Doing Business’ and create a robust private sector which fosters growth and sustainable development. The main objectives of undertaking the reforms are to; improve the business environment in order to boost local and foreign investment, improve performance of the public sector institutions in delivering quality service to the people, reduce the cost and enhance the ease of doing business and create value for money,” he said.

VP Mnangagwa said that Government had crafted nine Bills to address the ease of doing business in Zimbabwe and were at various stages of promulgation.

He added that Government had adopted the Zim-Asset economic blueprint to stimulate investment and growth.

“In order to stimulate investment in Zimbabwe and complement development in the Sadc region through economic intergration, Zimbabwe has formulated Zim-Asset 2013-2018 to achieve sustainable development and social equity that is anchored on indigenisation, empowerment and employment creation through the judicious exploitation of the country’s abundant human and natural resources. Zimbabwe is endowed with various trade and investment opportunities, which cut across value chains. Opportunities exist in such areas as beneficiation and technology transfer, supply of production equipment and capacity enhancement among others,” VP Mnangagwa said.

He said opportunities for investments existed in the Special Economic Zones sector, agriculture, mining, manufacturing, transport and infrastructure, ICTs, water, financial services and health.

VP Mnangagwa said three pilot SECs had been established and these were the Sunway City Integrated Industrial Park, Victoria Falls Integrated Tourism Park and the Bulawayo Industrial hub.

On agriculture, he said Zimbabwe had a favourable climate and land suitable for all-year-round farming and had strong backward and forward linkages that enhanced production value chain like maize to maize meal and stock feeds.

“Zimbabwe has started implementing Public Private Partnerships in the agricultural sector, notably the Special Programme on Maize Production for Import Substitution commonly known as Command Agriculture. I therefore, urge potential investors to come on board and join such Government initiated programmes. Results in the first year of this organic maize production programme are encouraging and have reached as much as 20 tonnes per hectare in one areas,” VP Mnangagwa added.

The Vice President added that mining offered abundant opportunities especially in value addition especially on minerals like platinum, asbestos, gold and diamond among others.

He said Government was keen on entering into partnerships for transport and infrastructure development to enhance access to local, regional and international markets. “The Government of Zimbabwe has set a target of universal access to ICT services through the telecommunications services, postal and courier services and value added services such as electronic money, applications and social media.

“Demand for Internet services has been spurred through the widespread increase in the use of smart phones and smart devices, thus calling for further telecommunications infrastructure development, e-services, advanced technologies, ICT software development, local assembly of ICT gadgets, content provision, satellite services and establishment of data centres and call centres,” he said.

On health, he said opportunities were there in the provision of specialist health services and rehabilitation of infrastructure, while the financial services sector needed lines of credit for on-lending to others.