Uncategorised

Government acts on high prices

21 Jun, 2015 - 00:06 0 Views
Government acts on high prices Mike Bimha

The Sunday Mail

2006-2-1-SUNDAY MAIL GRAPHIC PAGE 4Government is fast-tracking the National Competitiveness Commission Bill, which is designed to ensure fair pricing of basic goods and services and reduce the cost of doing business in Zimbabwe.

Zimbabwe will be one of the few countries in the world with tailor-made competitiveness legislation following concerns that local products and services were over-priced.

For instance, a litre of petrol costs about US$1,50 but goes for US$1,25 and US$1,07 in South Africa and Botswana, respectively, and economists have linked this to local undervaluing of the US Dollar.

Studies show that competitiveness frameworks spur economic growth, with Brazil, the United Arab Emirates, Ireland, South Korea and the United States being examples.

Industry and Commerce Minister Mike Bimha said last week: “Our officials are hard at work as we have asked them to see how best they can work with the Office of the Attorney-General to fast-track the Bill so that it is brought before Parliament as soon as possible.

“The ministry held its first stakeholder meeting last week to kick start the process of coming up with the Bill, which will then be presented to the AG’s Office. Government has identified competitiveness as one of the major steps to reviving the country’s economy. When competitiveness is implemented, it will lead to increased capacity utilisation and this will, in turn, result in re-industrialisation.

“It is a broad strategy that Government has adopted, and we are basically looking at all factors and regulatory frameworks that will ease doing business.”

Global competitiveness programmes expert Mr Kevin Murphy said the model would help grow the economy and send positive signals to investors.

“This is in line with the Government goal of achieving seven percent GDP growth and is also similar to what other high growth economies have done. It will also come to the attention of the international community in a favourable way.

“This action, following on a seven-rank increase in Zimbabwe’s Global Competitiveness Index score, shows the world that something interesting is going on in Zimbabwe.”

In May 2015, Cabinet approved the NCC Bill’s draft principles, and an ad-hoc committee was established up to advise Government on pricing matters.

The committee has recommended reducing costs related to fixed water tariffs, labour, Environmental Management Agency levies and National Social Security Authority contributions.

Key among the NCC’s functions will be to monitor, investigate and analyse costs and price trends of goods and services and benchmark them against those in the region and globally.

The Commission will develop periodic competitiveness frameworks and research and maintain a comprehensive nationwide statistical database to analyse competitiveness across all sectors.

In addition, inspectors will be deployed to enforce the law and those who fail to follow the competitiveness framework will be penalised.

The NCC will succeed the National Incomes and Pricing Commission, whose establishing Act is being repealed.

Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University economist and research associate Dr Gift Mugano said, “At this juncture, Zimbabwe needs to address economic challenges collectively, and the NCC is the tool to catalyse inclusivity in policy-making. The establishment of the commission comes at an opportune time when Government is accelerating implementation of the Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio-Economic Transformation.

“In this regard, its role will be to identify constraints to productivity and economic growth, and to recommend practical solutions. The commission’s role is also to ensure these solutions are developed with inclusive public-private dialogue that leads to broad support for Government’s competitiveness agenda.”

He added: “The most interesting feature of NCC, based on best practices, is that its work is done through strategic working groups, which report to a standing ministerial task force on competitiveness.

‘‘These strategic working groups are diverse and sector-specific.

“Hence, they will come up with solutions for each sector in an inclusive manner.

‘‘This process leads to consensus-building, which, in turn, reduces the cost of policy implementation and makes it easy to implement.”

Share This:

Survey


We value your opinion! Take a moment to complete our survey

This will close in 20 seconds