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But some economic commentators feel the local currency should be reintroduced when the country has adequate import cover and capacity utilisation in industry increases.
The proposal was part of the resolutions that came out of the just-ended 12th Zanu-PF Annual People’s Conference in Bulawayo .

Dr Gono said it was prudent to have a wider basket of currencies that would include the Zimbabwe dollar, the yuan, and the US dollar, the rand and pula that have been in use since the adoption of the multi-currency system in 2009.
“The form and manner as well as the resumption of the proposed new Zimbabwe dollar or whatever it will be called will obviously take into account our national reserves in terms of strategic and precious metals such as gold reserves for back up,” he said.

The reconstituted Zimbabwe dollar will be subject to discussion and approval by Zimbabweans and the authorities “alongside the yuan and other currencies, giving Zimbabwe a greater basket of choice than is currently the case”.
Dr Gono has on numerous occasions spoken of a precious metals-backed currency, a direction other countries are now moving towards.
The resolution from the Zanu-PF conference read: “To instruct Government to work out modalities for the reintroduction of domestic currency alongside the multi-currency system in order to address the current liquidity crisis and to enable our people to carry out their transactions”.

The Zimbabwe dollar was suspended in 2009 when Government adopted the multi-currency system.
In his 2012 budget statement recently, Finance Minister Tendai Biti said the multiple currency system would remain in use until the end of next year at the earliest.
Dr Gono said a bigger basket of currencies would significantly ease liquidity challenges.

“We must guard against putting all our eggs in one basket,” he said.
The debt crisis that the US and Europe are grappling with, Dr Gono said, were such that Zimbabwe “cannot remain blind to the fact that when the US and the eurozone catch a cold as is currently the case, those that depend on these currencies for their national accounting will also get a cold.”

Dr Gono said decisions being made in the US and eurozone and the support being given to the respective economies authenticated the desperate measures adopted by Zimbabwe when it faced economic challenges that saw inflation rise to high levels.
“While no central bank worth its salt can ever celebrate over troubles by other central banks, one cannot help but amuse oneself over how countries that have access to international resources and institutions such as the IMF, the World Bank and others and countries with no sanctions against them are dithering on the brink of collapse at the slightest shake-up in their backyard,” he said.

“Yet some of us have had to be content with worse challenges than those being experienced to date.”
Dr Gono insisted the troubled economies had lessons to learn from Zimbabwe ‘s experience.
Zanu-PF spokesperson Cde Rugare Gumbo said the implementation of the party’s resolution was only feasible after the tenure of the inclusive Government.

“Re-introduction of the Zim dollar is not possible under the inclusive Government. It is only possible after we have elections when we will have control of the finance portfolio,” he said.
“Once we are in control, we will then go to Parliament and make sure that it is ratified. At the moment we can make a proposal, but (Tendai) Biti does whatever he wants and this is why we are saying we should have elections.”

Cde Gumbo said Minister Biti was sabotaging the economy by making fictitious budgetary allocations to key sectors such as agriculture.
He said principals to the Global Political Agreement would deal with the issue to ensure that treasury releases money to fund key Government programmes.
“The principals will deal with that. They should make sure that they confront him in Cabinet to make sure that he releases the money,” he said.

Some economists said the economic environment was not yet conducive for the reintroduction of the local currency.
Bankers’ Association of Zimbabwe president Mr John Mushayavanhu said the country should first work to curtail the number of imports to make re-introduction of the domestic currency practical.

“When conditions are conducive we can always have our local currency in place,” he said.
“We are not yet there. The only possible time we can have the local currency is when we have adequate import cover. We should work to generate adequate exports because figures presented by the Minister of

Finance recently showed that we are importing more than what we are exporting so we can not have our own currency now.”
An economist Mr Takunda Mugaga said: “If we re-introduce the Zimdollar at the moment it is bound to be unpopular not because people do not like their local currency but it will be competing against strong

currencies such as the US dollar.”