 |
VAT
on basic foodstuffs comes as Zimbabwe's unemployment is over 90 percent and
poverty is rising ©Odd Andersen (AFP)
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Zimbabwe started levying
a 15 percent value-added tax on basic foodstuffs Wednesday, the government
said, dealing a further blow to cash-strapped consumers already battling to
survive in an ailing economy.
AFP
report continues:
The
tax affects meat and staple foods such as cereals, rice and potatoes.
Other
goods listed by the finance ministry include margarine, fish and pork.
The
move comes at a time when Zimbabweans are faced with unemployment of over 90
percent and rising levels of poverty.
The
country once considered the bread basket of Africa now imports most of its
food, after the agricultural sector was brought to its knees by the seizures of
white-owned commercial farms under President Robert Mugabe's administration.
In
2016 the government banned a range of food imports from neighbouring South
Africa, in a bid to boost the local market which is battling cash shortages.
The
VAT announcement was slammed as "anti-people" by the opposition
Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), which predicted a sharp increase in food
prices.
"This
is an anti-people statutory instrument which will make it hard for the poor to
afford meat," party spokesman Obert Gutu told AFP.
"The
regime is bankrupt and scrounging for money to pay a bloated civil service and
to pay for Mugabe's extravagant lifestyle," he added.
The
southern African country is this year running on a US$4.1 billion budget. The
long-ruling Mugabe is being blamed for ruining a once prosperous economy.
Mugabe,
who has been in power since 1980, turns 93 later this month.
He has faced calls to step down, but his ruling ZANU-PF has endorsed him to stand for the 2018 presidential elections.
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