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Minister Patrick Chinamasa

Business Editor
FINANCE and Economic Development Minister Patrick Chinamasa has appealed for support from parliamentarians in facilitating improved ease of doing business in the country so as to attract foreign direct investment and foster meaningful economic growth.Zimbabwe continues to rank lower as an investment destination compared to neighbouring countries such as Mozambique with several bottlenecks blamed for stifling economic development.

Chinamasa did not mince his words while contributing to debate during the just ended 2015 pre-budget consultation meeting in Victoria Falls.

He called for a speedy business modelling shift and implementation of reforms  that would lead to vibrant economic turnaround.

“For me the future is very exciting and it’s beckoning. What we need is to work towards that future. We need to do all we can to attract foreign direct investment (FDI) and a new attitude towards investors.

“We should discard negative perceptions about certain nationalities, even Nigerians and Chinese who want to invest here,” said Chinamasa.
“Enhancing the ease of doing business is very critical and we need your support in this. We need to review our immigration laws with respect to how we treat different nationalities. The wage and pricing structure in our private sector is wrong.

“We need to prioritise power generation infrastructure and have increased oversight from you.”

The minister said increased support should be channelled towards developing the potential in the informal sector, which employs close to 5,8 million people, according to Zimstat.

“We need to put more thought into how we can grow the future formal sector from the informal sector,” he said.

Chinamasa said it was disheartening that Malawian farmers have surpassed Zimbabweans in maize output while using manual labour as they do not have draught power.

He said last year the country recorded a paltry $400 million FDI compared to about $4 billion recorded in Mozambique.

Chinamasa also urged legislators to craft laws that would improve the economic environment and urged them to support the adoption of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) Debt Assumption Bill.