The Sunday News
Although some efforts have been made to revive the country’s economy it looks like nothing has been done on the clothing industry.
The government authorities have tried in vain to stop second hand clothes from entering Zimbabwe because people are buying them as long as there are limited efforts which are being put in place to revive our clothing industry it means the second hand clothes from the banned bales will continue to flood our markets.
The government through responsible ministry should come up with a budget specifically for the revival of our clothing industry because some people are taking advantage of this to bring bales of used clothes which are cheaper. We once heard that there was a fund for the manufacturing industry especially those in Bulawayo but to my surprise l only saw one big company along Plumtree road which opened. The rest are now being used by some churches who have also taken that advantage to convert the companies into huge churches for easy money from worshippers. The cost pf producing products is very high in Zimbabwe compared to other countries in the region and this has forced the prices of clothes in our shops to be very expensive and this has forced people to illegally bring second hand clothes into the country and if this situation continues like this it means our industry will take a very long time to recover.
The government can help our clothing industry to recover by sourcing some funds even from friendly countries to revive this industry. I heard that there are some material these companies need on their day to day operations but they are very expensive. Electricity tariffs are also very high and this is making their difficult to operate.
We hope that a solution will be found urgently because even the few workers in this industry are also crying about their salaries which are very low when compared with other citizens.
Eddious Masundire shumba, Bulawayo.
