Foreign exchange reforms in Zimbabwe
The Central Bank of Zimbabwe is planning to provide a certain number of licenses to retailers enabling them to trade goods on foreign currency. Such act is proposed to improve the situation in the country experiencing a recession for almost a decade. It is planned to provide 250 wholesalers and 1000 retailers with corresponding licenses for the trial period of 18 month says the Governor Gideon Gono. The purpose is to decrease shortages of basic goods but not the will to “dollarize” the economy of the country.
The situation with shortages of basic goods lasts in the country since 2001 that was the year when the president Robert Mugabe started to catch commercial farms owned by the white people and thus decreased the income from the export. The temporary way out was the fuel coupons for goods after the inflation reached its maximum – 11.2 million percent in June thus leading to the collapse of the national currency.
According to Gono announcement the current changes are nothing but the adequate way out of the negative situation the country’s economy stays in. The core of the reforms is in the making the foreign exchange and basic goods more available at the formal market. Furthermore he has said that the foreign exchange offices will be able to accumulate up to 85 percent of the all earnings and the rest part being oriented to the Central Bank of the country. However, the central bank has increased the level of the foreign exchange earnings accumulated by the exporters to 75 percent.
Another initiative of the Central Bank is to sell a bond with an aim to increase foreign exchange funds to pay for the basic goods. This bond is supposed to have the maturity of 6 month and will bring an interest of 15 percent in USD.
Central Bank also tries to increase foreign exchange earnings with the help of reckoning with the gold manufacturers at the interbank exchange rate and providing them with 150 percent delivery bonus.
At the moment the most part of the residents purchase the USD at the black market at the rate of 30,000 per USD.
