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Herald Reporters
CONSUMERS have welcomed the Government’s decision to suspend duty on basic commodities including cooking oil, sugar and maize meal, to cushion Zimbabweans from price shocks occasioned by geopolitical developments in Europe and local speculative behaviour, which caused price increases and artificial shortages.

Local producers, who have not been spared by the imported inflation, either from raw material price increases or fuel costs, have responded by increasing prices of the goods they make although some manufacturers have tended to go on the higher side.

Finance and Economic Development Minister Professor Mthuli Ncube announced the policy shift on Sunday.

Yesterday, Prof Ncube gazetted Statutory Instrument 98 of 2022 titled, ‘Customs and Excise (Suspension) (Amendment) Regulations, 2022 (No.260)’, putting into effect the policy pronouncement.

The measures were effective from yesterday to November 16.

Products that will be imported duty-free are rice, flour, margarine, salt, milk powder, infants’ milk formula, tea (flavoured or not), petroleum jelly, toothpaste, bath soap, laundry bar and washing powder.

Permanent Secretary for Finance and Economic Development Mr George Guvamatanga has since written to Zimra acting Commissioner-General, Ms Regina Chinamasa, authorising the national revenue collector “to suspend duty” on the products that have been listed.

“The Zimbabwe Revenue Authority is also requested to urgently draft the necessary legal instrument and implement the duty suspension beginning midnight, that is 17 May 2022, which should coincide with the gazetting of the relevant legislation,” reads the letter to Comm-Gen Chinamasa dated May 16.

A Harare resident, Mr Farai Sianango, commended the Government’s decision to remove duty on basic commodities saying it would benefit consumers since prices of commodities “are likely to go down” on improved availability.

Mrs Mary Seremano also said: “Without duty being paid on basic commodities, we really see a change in the markets. As a trader, I believe it is a good thing because we are going to remove the cost that we were adding on the goods that were covered for duty, which means the basic commodities will now be available at an affordable price.”

Another city resident, Mrs Patience Kabayanjiri, said the suspension of duty comes as a relief to consumers.

“We commend the Government for this move and we expect to see a sharp decrease in prices of basic commodities. The prices that we are seeing right now in supermarkets are not pleasing, but we believe we are going to see a change after this.”

Mr Godfrey Manyara said: “There is nothing wrong with what the Government has done and we want to see the results and they should do follow-ups on retailers.”

Mrs Dorothy Chatira appreciated the Government’s efforts in ensuring lower prices but implored retailers to reduce prices, “especially for our local products”.

“We are glad the Government took this step, it was getting out of hand. Now we are waiting for the prices to decrease but the Government should now do a follow-up and check if prices are indeed going to be reduced,” she said.

The new policy on duty free imports was adopted by the Government following unsustainable price increases in the last two months, most of them linked to speculative behaviour on the parallel foreign exchange market and the developments in Ukraine.