The Sunday News
Roberta Katunga, Senior Business Reporter
THIS year’s edition of the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair saw some manufacturing companies abandoning constructed pavilions and moving into exhibition halls as the sector continues to face viability challenges.
A survey by Sunday News Business showed that some companies’ traditional premises were locked as either the companies did not participate at the exhibition or moved into the halls.
Some of the empty pavilions included the Bata, Zisco Steel, Blue Ribbon, National Blankets and Astra Paints stands.
Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries president Busisa Moyo said the private sector was reeling from high costs and viability challenges.
“While we are upbeat, resilient and positive about our future we should also be sober about our realities. The ZITF can be costly for companies that are struggling, a lot of companies are also relinquishing and moving into halls,” said Mr Moyo.
He, however, said the halls had more traffic and there weren’t fixed rental costs and this strategy by companies was simply a cost management tool that they employed.
“The Government Departments are merely filling in the vacuum that a struggling private sector has left,” he said.
In an interview an official with Blue Ribbon said the company was still in the process of relaunching after being taken over by Tanzanian investor Bakhresa Group in February. BRI had been under judicial management since 2012. We were not ready to exhibit this year as we are still in the process of relaunching but hopefully next year we will be there,” said BRI.
Meanwhile, the country’s emerging dairy products manufacturing giant, Alpha Omega Dairy’s new products on the market has driven a three percent growth in total volume for the first quarter of the year.
Group operations manager Mr Fidelis Madzorera said the new products that include the vanilla ice cream sandwich were doing well and despite economic hardships have been accepted well by customers recording a month on month growth of about seven percent.
“Like all manufacturers we have been affected by the economic hardships but comparing the first quarter of the year to last year same period, we have actually been increasing in total volume. Our ice cream sandwich which is a biscuit and ice cream is one of the products that have been doing very well in the market,” said Mr Madzorera.
According to CZI, due to the challenges facing the economy, capacity utilisation in the manufacturing sector has dropped to about 34,3 percent.
