Government and business meet to strengthen cooperation

Online Reporter

THE business community has pledged to work with the Government on economic development policies, as the country pushes for a private sector-led economy.

Last year, the Government signed memoranda of understanding (MoUs) with several business management organisations (BMOs) to strengthen cooperation in creating a robust and sustainable business environment that supports the national economic development agenda.

The Ministry of Industry and Commerce on Wednesday engaged the Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries, a business lobby group.

During the meeting, Industry and Commerce Minister Mangaliso Ndlovu said the Government remains committed to working with the private sector.

“This is all about reviewing the engagements that are critical in facilitating the partnerships. Our engagements were cordial, as they set the tone for more cooperation, riding on the existing relationships as well as the MoUs that were signed recently, and the purpose was also to review them for the benefit of all the parties,” said Minister Ndlovu.

The Government will launch National Development Strategy 2 this year, which is expected to pay the way for the country achieving an upper middle-income economy by 2030.

“We signed MoUs with various players last year and the essential aspect of signing the MoUs was to create an engagement framework which we had not had before then,” he said.

“The engagement framework now facilitates such engagements, where such meetings with the business sector take place every month.

“Today (yesterday) I was meeting with BMOs together with the sub-sectors just to get an update on where we are and the implementation of the industrial reconstruction and growth plan and also to hear from the business sector what they are going through and where they would like us to collaborate on some policy recommendations.

“Very soon, we will be intensifying our industrial development policy itself and we are also in parallel in coming up with the National Development Strategy 2, so we want to have a policy framework that speaks to each other and that is aligned with the business interest,” he said.

The Government is hopeful the private sector will consolidate economic development goals.

CZI chief executive officer Ms Sekai Kuvarika called for mutual understanding with the Government on matters of national economic interest.

“The business community is there to work with the Government and what we are doing today is to further explore engagements, riding on the need to reinforce the private sector-led economy,” she said.

“We shall continue to find each other based on the need to boost relationships and focus on economic growth as the private sector. Working with the Government allows us to network and see what we can do in the future.”

Buy Zimbabwe general manager Mr Alois Burutsa said a lot needs to be done to consolidate the engagements.

“We find them to be fruitful and cordial, so riding on what happened today, indeed we are really committed to upscaling the ties and focus on the job at hand, which is to review cooperation, identify loopholes and focus on the way forward,” said Mr Burutsa

The private sector is expected to contribute to the achievement of a projected 6 percent growth rate by year-end.

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