Budget proposes measures to curb leakages
Presenting the National Budget Statement to the Parliament of Zimbabwe yesterday, the Minister of Finance and Economic Development, Prof Mthuli Ncube said that mineral leakages in Zimbabwe have been on the rise depriving the country of foreign currency earnings, this has led the government to come up with measures to curb leakages.
Rudairo Dickson Mapuranga
The Finance Minister said that the government is reviewing and tightening the Gold trade act capacitating the gold mobilisation unit as a measure to stop gold leakages from the country.
Experts are of the belief that more than half of gold produced in Zimbabwe is finding its way out of the country due to different reasons chief being the recently reduced forex retention from 75% to 55%.
“Mineral exports remain the major sources of foreign currency, especially gold. However, leakages have been on the rise depriving the country of foreign currency earnings. Government is, therefore, reviewing and tightening the Gold trade act, and capacitating gold mobilisation unit” said Mthuli.
Professor Ncube also said that his government is looking for measures to make sure that various mining firms join the Extractive Industry Transparent Initiative (EITI) in order to improve transparency and accountability in the mining sector.
“In addition, with the increasing call for transparent and accountability in the sector, discussions are underway with various stakeholders on joining the extractive industry transparent initiative (EITI), which will be pursued during 2020,” said Prof Mthuli Ncube.
The Finance Minister also said that the “use it or lose it” policy will be implemented to curb leakages from miners supposedly on care and maintenance or on hold whilst being mined Nicodemusly.
The use it or lose it policy was proposed by indigenous Zimbabwean miners who said hoarding of claims across all minerals was limiting factor in the growth of the sector.
The Minister also said that his government is going to finalise the amendments to the Mines and Minerals act as well as pushing for digitalisation of the title registration, geological findings and other information as a way to limit leakages.
“Other interventions on improving production and transparent in the Mining sector include the following,
- Enforcement of the “use it or lose it ” principle to prevent speculative hoarding of claims across all minerals.
- Finalising the amendments to mines and minerals act.
- Operationalising the automated mining cadastre information system
- Rolling out of gold service centres in all major production centres and full capacitation of HCCL increase throughput from the underground mine.” He said.