How Zimbabwe intends to reduce poverty

With the economy down on its knees and citizens calling on the President Robert Mugabe to step down, plans to reduce poverty in Zimbabwe are likely to be brushed off and political banter.

But Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa announced yesterday that the country will be launching its Interim Poverty Reduction Strategy on 26 September.

He said the strategy was formulated after broad consultations from district to national level in May followed by a validation workshop that was held on 22 June.

The strategy has six pillars, which are:

• Pillar I: Agriculture Productivity, Growth and Rural Food Security, focusing on agriculture productivity, irrigation rehabilitation and development, financing of agriculture, marketing of agricultural commodities, land use planning andrestructuring of agricultural parastatals;
• Pillar II: Social Sector Policies and Expenditures, focusing on health, education water and sanitation, social protection, gender, women and youth development;
• Pillar III: Private Sector Development, focusing on manufacturing, micro, small and medium enterprise development, mining, tourism and inclusive banking;
• Pillar IV: Infrastructure Development, relating to energy, information and communication technology, housing and transport;
• Pillar V: Environment and Climate Change, focussing on climate and the environment;
• Pillar VI: Strengthening Governance and Institutional Capacity, to strengthen our laws and effective service delivery and combating corruption.

Zimbabwe is rated as one of the best project planners but at the same time it is one of the worst implementers.

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