Ministers responsible for finance, trade and industry, minerals and energy, and land and agriculture from South Africa and Zimbabwe met for two days in Pretoria. The meetings were part of work in progress in preparation for a bilateral meeting between the Presidents of South Africa and Zimbabwe.
Among issues discussed were land reform and the agricultural sector; mining and energy; finance, and trade and industry.
Information was exchanged on the land reform programmes in the two countries. Both programmes seek to address the challenges of decongestion in communal areas, food security at the household level, employment creation and increasing the contribution of agriculture to economic growth.
The Zimbabwean programme is supported by an ongoing sector analysis, which seeks to facilitate an increase in the contribution of smallholder farmers (including resettled farmers) to the agricultural economy. It will also quantify the magnitude of land underutilization in the large-scale commercial farming sector, which has occurred in part as a result of the intensification of production. These trends have created a significant opportunity for the Government of Zimbabwe to design and implement a land reform programme with the imperative of satisfying land hunger and using agriculture land more productively.
Discussions took place to find ways of resuming direct fuel supplies to Noczim. It is important to note that Noczim is not receiving free fuel from Sasol but is paying for all supplies from Sasol.
It was reported that the debt account had been brought up to date by ZESA by December 2000 and ZESA has since been honouring its current account. Senior representatives of the two utilities have reported that their trading relationship has been enhanced.
The two parties expressed the need to develop indigenous mining companies, especially small and junior scale mining companies, and also promote the enhancement of mineral beneficiation. They furthermore agreed to cooperate and participate in the forthcoming Australia-Southern Africa Mining Investment Forum, which will be held in South Africa in July 2001.
The parties reiterated their commitment and respect for property rights as enshrined in the Bill of Rights of their respective Constitutions.
There is continuous policy dialogue between bilateral and multilateral institutions with the Zimbabwean government. An IMF team has been in Harare since 8th March 2001 as part of this policy dialogue. There are no major policy differences between the government of Zimbabwe and the IMF.
The meeting noted that steps need to be taken to mitigate the macroeconomic problems currently experienced in Zimbabwe and to establish a good microeconomic environment for economic growth. This needs to be a carefully managed programme.