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President Mnangagwa on Friday said Zimbabwe should leapfrog its development agenda through science and technology to catch up with other countries.

Cde Mnangagwa said the country should come up with innovations that will see the utilisation and development of local products.
President Mnangagwa who was addressing Cabinet Ministers, captains of industry, academics, students and senior Government officials after touring the University of Zimbabwe innovation and industrial hub on campus and its agro industrial park at its farm in Mazowe, said people should abandon the long-held perception that everything produced in Western countries is superior.

“The majority mostly of my age, when we see a cake, we think it must be white produced, we think a cake is a product of the West, nay it is not true. I have seen cakes produced at these hubs from mhunga, mapfunde and zviyo, anonaka zvekuti heki,” said President Mnangagwa.

He said the harnessing of science and technology by the country’s young men and women innovators to produce high quality products with high dietary properties should be applauded.

President Mnangagwa commended the 5.0 education model that the Second Republic is pushing saying it inspires innovation. He challenged Government ministries, departments and agencies to stop mourning about resources but should instead be innovative in search of solutions to the country’s challenges in line with what is envisaged by the economic blue-print National Development Strategy 1.

The UZ, The National University of Science and Technology (Nust), the Midlands State University (MSU) and Great Zimbabwe University took a lead in the fight against Covid-19 pandemic by manufacturing face masks, sanitisers and other consumables.

The institutions of higher learning have responded positively to President Mnangagwa’s call for universities and other institutions of higher learning to produce graduates capable of producing transformative innovations which he said are critical for Zimbabwe to achieve rapid modernisation.

The universities have already demonstrated that given the necessary support they can address many of the challenges facing the country.

Technological innovation underpins Zimbabwe’s endeavour to industrialise and create a prosperous economy.

President Mnangagwa has said the new education model should give impetus to institutions of higher learning to consolidate their position as centres of excellence in science education.

Chinhoyi University of Technology (CUT) has built a state-of-the-art facility that produces and stores at least seven million semen straws per year, a confirmation that our institutions of higher learning are taking seriously the call by Government for them to lead in the country’s industrialisation thrust.

President Mnangagwa said in order to promote competition between and among universities, he will in June award a bus to an institution with the best and most innovations and might make the event regular in future.