THE Zimbabwe Investment Authority (ZIA) approved investment projects worth $38,6 million in the first month of this year, with the majority being in the mining sector.
Tarisai Mandizha
The approved investment projects were almost half of the projects that were approved over the same period last year due to the slow uptake in projects.
A total of seven projects have so far been approved this year with a potential to create 976 jobs compared to 13 approvals recorded last year.
The mining sector received investment worth $33,1 million for three projects, followed by manufacturing with $4 million for three projects and the services sector was $1,2 million with one project.
No investments were received for the agriculture, construction, tourism and transport sectors.
ZIA said during the period under review export earnings amounted to $44,5 million from $7,4 million recorded in the prior year.
British Virgin Islands accounted for the bulk of the investment totalling $28,7 million, followed by Sudan with $3,9 million mainly in the mining sector, Egypt with $3 million and China with $2,9 million mainly in the manufacturing, mining and services sector during the period under review.
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According to the World Bank, Zimbabwe’s business environment was generally ranked as highly uncompetitive, with a ranking of 170 out of 189 countries in 2013.
In his 2014 National Budget statement, Finance minister Patrick Chinamasa said government was working towards the implementation of reforms in dealing with construction permits, registering property, getting credit, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts and resolving insolvency.
“Pursuant to this, the (ZIA) will engage respective ministries, departments and institutions to speed up the implementation of doing business reforms, with the support of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa and the World Bank,” Chinamasa said.
He said government would also extend the preferred economic operator status and implementation of the duty drawback system which would revitalise export of goods and services.
