Off the wire
• Starting lineup of Austria for Euro 2016 Group F match against Hungary  • Starting lineup of Hungary for Euro 2016 Group F match against Austria  • Xinhua world news summary at 1530 GMT, June 14  • U.S. cargo ship departs from space station  • Malaysia condemns execution of Canadian hostage by Philippine militants  • Japan's Nissan develops bio-ethanol powered system for vehicles  • Security forces fight IS militants in Iraq, as battles to push into Fallujah continue  • Some 60,000 migrant deaths recorded over last 20 years: report  • Leading gold producer sees output reach record high  • New poll says U.S. influence to diminish in Asia-Pacific  
You are here: 　 Home

Roundup: Zimbabwe steps up ease of doing business reforms to attract more FDI

Xinhua, June 14, 2016 Adjust font size:

Zimbabwe has stepped up reform efforts to improve the ease of doing business and is aiming to be among the top 100 countries on the World Bank's ease of doing business index, a senior government official said Tuesday.

While not indicting the timeline by which the country intends to meet the target, the country has in recent months been implementing a raft of reforms to improve the business climate and attract more foreign direct investment.

Zimbabwe is currently ranked 155 out of the 189 economies on the WB ease of doing business report for 2015, an increase of 16 places from 2014.

Speaking at a workshop to review the second 100 days of a rapid results initiative on the ease of doing business, deputy chief secretary in the Office of the President and Cabinet Ray Ndhlukula said Zimbabwe was poised to further improve on the WB ranking due to the ongoing reforms.

The second 100 days are a followup to the first 100 days of doing business reforms that ended in December 2015 and saw the necessary memorandum of understandings and principles on various legislations being drafted.

"We strongly hope that with the progress so far registered and the feedback that will be provided by the beneficiaries of the reforms, Zimbabwe will move up on the World Bank's ranking on the Ease of Doing Business from the current position of 155 out of the 189 countries," Ndhlukula said.

"Our goal is to make Zimbabwe's ranking to be on the top 100 on the Ease of Doing Business," he added.

However, Ndhlukula said achieving this would require a change in mindset among public servants, strong collaboration and partnerships as well as adopting a whole of government approach in tackling bottlenecks that constrain the country's business operating environment.

In the second 100 days that ended in May 2016, there was progress on drafting Bills for several laws but permanent secretary in the Ministry of Justice Virginia Mabiza said in total there were 13 pieces of legislation that needed to be worked on to improve the ease of doing business in the country.

Under the reforms, nine technical areas that need to be reformed have been identified and these are: paying taxes; starting a business; trading across borders; resolving insolvency; getting credit; enforcing contracts; registering property; construction permits and protecting minority investors.

Delegates were told that in the second 100 days, the number of days it takes to start a business in the country had been reduced from 30 days to 13 days while a credit registry system will go live on July 31 as part of measures to enhance access to credit by businesses.

The goal of reducing costs of exports and imports by 30 percent by May 13, 2016 was 77 percent complete while the goal of reducing the time it takes to pay taxes from 242 hours to 160 hours was 44 percent complete.

The goal on reducing the time it takes to obtain construction permits from 446 days to 120 days by May 13 was 83.4 percent complete while the goal on reducing the time it takes to register a property from 36 days to 14 days was 91.75 percent complete.

Zimbabwe's FDI has remained very low, hovering around 400 million U.S. dollars over the last three years due to an unconducive economic environment. Endit