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Business Reporter
THE National Economic Consultative Forum is gathering views for the development of a broad-based National Competitiveness Assessment Report (NCAR) which analyses Zimbabwe’s current economic position and performance relative to other countries.

The competitiveness assessment report benchmarks the country’s performance on carefully selected indicators globally and against selected comparator country economies.

The assessment uses current and trend data. It includes current, locally available information and dozens of data sources; hence not just Global Competitiveness Report and Doing Business data.

During the focus group meetings, NECF will present a draft NCAR report for discussion.

Focus group meetings were held on Wednesday in Masvingo and Bulawayo while Mutare and Gweru had their meetings yesterday.

More meetings will be held in other centres while the Harare discussion is scheduled for the first week of next month.

The focus group meetings in the various centres will be followed by a validation workshop that has tentatively been set for October 14.

The validation workshop is expected to consolidate the ideas solicited during the focus group discussions and come up with a final national competitiveness report.

The report is expected to be launched on October 29.

NECF’s focus group meetings target Government officials, the academia, labour and civil society.

The NCAR is expected to address Zimbabwe’s specific competitive issues beyond the global competitive reports. The report will be launched by Government and inform economic debate and policy issues.

NECF chief economist Mr Godwin Murehwa confirmed that the process to develop the competitiveness report is already under way.

“Currently the motion is towards attracting investors. The competitiveness report is what investors look at. So we want to come up with our own national report that will tell the correct position on the ground,” said Mr Murehwa.

“Global reports are usually thin but ours will be broad-based that is why we are getting ideas from around the country. We hope it will put in place the correct position on the ground and trigger investment,” he said.

Some of the objectives and benefits of a National Competitiveness Assessment Report include that the NCAR provides a baseline of information for understanding a country’s competitiveness. The assessment uses the most current, authoritative, comparable data. It enables annual tracking of Zimbabwe’s progress in competitiveness.

NCAR provides fact-driven basis for dialogue, prioritisation and action planning regarding the economy. The assessment highlights areas of strong and weak performance.

It suggests interpretations and implications for the economy. It does so in a way that all actors can agree on the data and its implications.

The assessment provides or facilitates a Zimbabwean perspective on the trajectory of the economy and key constraints to competitiveness, provides information and guidance for policy-makers, by spotlighting urgent issues in the economy that need to be resolved, and opportunities to confront and resolve binding constraints.

It provides data for economic research, and stimulates economic research in universities and think-tanks, is often used to promote the country — investment promotion and introduces accountability for implementation of policies and initiative by providing an annual “dashboard” for measuring competitiveness improvements.

Zimbabwe will join Tanzania, Egypt and Senegal among African countries to compile national competitive assessment reports with a view to improving the business environment in a manner that makes them competitive.

“In doing so, the country has realised the under-utilised value of the annual WEF Global Competitiveness Index and Doing Business Indicators, while at the same time recognising the limitations inherent in their methodologies or abilities to tell a complete story.

“Pursuant to this Zimbabwe has taken it upon herself to present a balanced assessment of the country’s own national competitiveness, drawing on many globally comparable indicators as well as national information,” said Mr Murehwa.

A National Competitiveness Assessment Report is a carefully selected compendium of data and interpretation that informs by analysing a region or nation’s current economic standing and framework and assesses how it performs relative to other countries.