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Pamela Shumba, Senior Business Reporter
AN American company has expressed investment interest in different sectors of the country’s economy, an indicator of a positive business environment under the new dispensation led by President Emmerson Mnangagwa.

United States Ambassador to Zimbabwe, Mr Brian Nichols, revealed this during a closed door meeting with Deputy Minister of Industry and Commerce Raj Modi at Mhlahlandlela Government Complex in Bulawayo yesterday.

“I had a meeting with the US Ambassador and we discussed a number of issues including Zimbabwe’s economic recovery and how they can help us to empower our youths.

“Regarding investment, the Ambassador said an American company called GE Hydro is planning to invest millions of dollars in Zimbabwe,” said Deputy Minister Modi.

“This is a welcome development and I assured them that the new Government is committed to the country’s economic recovery and we’re gradually working on it. It will not happen overnight.”

He said the Government was implementing a number of policies that will bring in more investors and improve the economy.

“Ambassador Nichols said about $230 million has been set aside by his country for Zimbabwe for various sectors of the economy, which include health targeting the mitigation of cholera and HIV.

“He said the American Embassy’s economic section is very busy with investors calling to inquire about investment opportunities in Zimbabwe,” said Deputy Minister Modi.

Government has said it is accelerating the ease of doing business reforms in the country to attract more foreign and domestic capital into the local economy.

President Mnangagwa is on record as saying his term will be underlined by deliberate policies and strategies aimed at making Zimbabwe an upper middle income country by 2030.

The country’s ease of doing business environment has been improving since the coming in of the new dispensation in November last year with market watchers saying the resignation of former President Robert Mugabe had also seen the country’s political risk improving by 50 percent.

The Government also launched the economic recovery and stabilisation document, the Transitional Stabilisation Programme (TSP) to run from October 2018 to December 2020, which aims at stabilising the macro-economy through fostering fiscal discipline, infrastructure development and export growth.

The TSP is the first of a series of time-bound development strategies that will be implemented by the Government in its quest to transform Zimbabwe into a middle income economy by 2030. — @pamelashumba1.