Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe governor John Mangudya
THE Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) has said it is targeting a minimum of US$20 million per week in gold exports as volumes have begun rising following the implementation of the export incentive scheme in May this year.
RBZ governor John Mangudya told a Confederation of Zimbabwe Retailers breakfast meeting on SI 64 of 2016 and the impact of New RBZ Measures to the Economy, that the bank was now earning between US$15 million to US$16 million in gold exports per week up from US$12 million per week.
“We have seen gold exports going up and we are happy about that. Gold miners now sell to RBZ because of the incentive. More than 50 percent of the gold is smuggled but we are aiming to reduce that. We are targeting at least US$20 million per week in gold exports,” he said.
Mangudya also the central bank was in a safe finance position to buy as much gold as can be produced.
“We have been paying US$5 million to small scale gold miners per week but the figure has since gone up to US$8 million per week because of the five percent incentive,” he said.
Mangudya said the monetary measures have seen valuable improvements in the economy and dismissed the fact that banks were externalising money.
He also added that no bank was keeping money offshore for the sake of trying to sabotage the economy of the country adding that the monitoring committee was meeting every week to ensure that does not happen. This comes in the wake of reports that one of the foreign banks operating in the country was misrepresenting to clients that the RBZ was confiscating all export receipts yet this was not the case.
In order to curb foreign currency deficit, Mangudya said the Central Bank was organizing a nostro stabilisation facility to ensure that the gap between the demand for foreign currency and the money that is available can be narrowed.
“We have arranged facilities for nostro stabilization to ensure that the money needed for importation and that is needed to do business is available,” he said.
Concerning bond notes, Mangudya said the Central Bank was not forcing the country to use bond notes but was monetising the import incentive through bond notes without doing away with the multicurrency regime.
“If you are getting a US$400 salary…you will still get US$400 in US dollars, bonds note, rand or euros. If you don’t want them then you use plastic money. We are not forcing anybody to use bond notes,” he said.
Mangudya said the introduction of monetary measures also saw the usage of POS increasing from US$4,1 billion in January to US$5,5 billion at the end of July and the number of machines from 17 000 as at May to 20 000. FinX
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