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Michael Magoronga, Midlands Correspondent

THE move by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) to inject $1 billion new notes and coins by mid this month will ease cash shortages, economists have said.

Bank queues had become a norm in Zimbabwe since 2016 with desperate depositors struggling to access their hard-earned money due to cash shortages. 

The trend had given cash dealers an opportunity to make mega profits through selling cash at a premium of up to 60 percent.

Economic analyst and businessman Mr Eddie Cross, who is also member of the RBZ monetary policy committee, said bank queues will be a thing of the past once the new notes come into circulation.

“The move increases the availability of cash in circulation and what it means is that there would be no bank queues because money will be readily available,” he said.

Zimbabwe National Chamber of Commerce (ZNCC) chief executive officer, Mr Christopher Mugaga said the market needs to understand the new notes and coins were not a new currency.

“There is a misnomer that the RBZ introduced a new currency, this is not a currency, we already have a currency, the move is to stimulate and improve cash availability. That should be corrected,” he said.

“Currently we have less money supply in circulation. I do not see the serious input the cash injection is going to have on the economy.”

ZNCC national vice president, Dr Tinashe Manzungu, also said the move to inject more cash was a short-term solution and urged authorities to continue to fine tune macro-economic fundamentals.