Smuggling a serious concern for manufacturers

Published: 04 March 2014

Olivine Industries managing director Jonas Mushangari has called upon Parliamentarians to put in place measures to curb smuggling of products mainly from South Africa as this was seriously hurting industry.

Mushangari told the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Industry and Commerce this afternoon that although the smuggling was mostly being perpetrated by small-scale traders, its impact was not negligible.

"There is excessive smuggling at our country's borders. According to a research that we carried out we discovered, for instance that in a single day an average of 64 buses are coming into the country on a daily basis, and each of these buses will be carrying at least 100 boxes of cooking oil. The impact of this on the economy is not insignificant," he said.

Despite some measure that have been put in place by the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra) to curb rampant smuggling such as border patrols, road blocks, site visits, post importation audits, scanners, physical searches, whistle-blowers’ initiatives, and cargo monitoring, smuggling is still negatively impacting on the economy. Mushangari lamented alleged corruption by Zimra officials at border posts, which he said was perpetuating smuggling of goods from neighbouring countries.

The Olivine boss also called upon the Government to protect the manufacturing sector from cheap imports, calling the present free reign of imports a "self-defeating process."

He said it would benefit local manufacturers if the Government could set up non-monetary barriers to finished products imports from neighboring countries, although allowing for bulk importation.

Observers have generally lamented the high cost of locally manufactured products in the country compared to imported products.

The high cost of producing goods in the country, resulting from poor inefficiencies, has however put on damper on calls by the manufacturing sector for Government to regulate the flow of imported goods.
- BH24

Tags: Zimra,