BY Kenias Chivuzhe
A Currency Indaba is set to be held this month as part of efforts to find ways of stabilising the local currency and consolidating macroeconomic stability.
In an interview during a POLAD economic committee workshop in Mutare this Sunday, POLAD Thematic Committee Chairperson, Mr Trust Chikohora said the Indaba seeks to deal with issues affecting economic stability through fuelling inflation and price hikes.
“We have been meeting as the POLAD Economic Committee here in Mutare to review our work plan and we have adopted the work plan for the rest of the year. Secondly, we have been looking at the state of the economy and the challenges specially to do with currency market. In that regard we have resolved that we should, as POLAD host a Currency Indaba where we will bring stakeholders together that include your business community, Bankers’ Association, Mining Associations, Zimbabwe Stock Exchange, the Reserve Bank, Ministry of Finance, ZNCC, CZI, Chamber of Mines, consumer and labour bodies and we hope to have His Excellency participate at the event as the Guest of Honour. We will then have people discuss and come up with solutions to stabilise our currency market so that we can stabilise the economy and achieve growth. The Currency Indaba is slated for this month, as the issue is urgent to achieve economic stability,” he said.
Mr Chikohora noted that the parallel market is the biggest challenge affecting the economy, hence the need for discussions around exchange rate stability.
“As you are aware government has come up with a raft of measures to try and arrest the parallel market. We now have the auction system with an auction rate, the Inter-bank market system with an Inter-bank rate and we still have the parallel market and different exchange rates. We have people still pricing using parallel rate with prices and inflation rising. So, it is important that we deal with the currency market in order to move towards a single exchange rate which is stable and move towards price stability which will arrest inflation and lead to economic growth in line with the vision 2030,” he added.
This comes after President Emmerson Mnangagwa announced a raft of measures to tame inflation and preserve the value of the local currency.
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