RBZ has so far secured $215m and the balance is expected to come by end of next month, governor John Mangudya said yesterday.
Presenting his mid-term monetary policy statement, Mangudya came up with eight measures set to enhance confidence and production in the economy.
“In order to deal with the current delays in the processing of outgoing foreign payments by banks, the [central] bank has managed to secure facilities in an amount of $215m from international finance institutions . . . In addition, negotiations are at an advanced stage to raise $330m from regional sources to enhance production and improve the liquidity situation in the country,” he said.
A nostro account is a bank account held in a foreign bank and is usually denominated in the currency of that foreign country. Currently, the nostro position of the banking sector is $250m and cannot support the real time gross settlement position of $1 billion, which required around $450m.
He said ideally, banks were expected to arrange such facilities for their clients, but had limited access to foreign finance due to the country’s high risk premium.
Finance minister Patrick Chinamasa recently said international banks were terminating relationships with local banks.
Bank customers have been facing challenges in making payments, with some actually having to use foreign banks, who charged 10% for any payment.
This has resulted in some suppliers failing to get their products on time.
Mangudya doubled the amount of money that can be secured offshore without exchange control approval to $20m.
He said the bank would extend export incentive scheme at level between 2,5% to 5% to Diaspora remittances, including any form of private unrequited transfers on funds remitted to Zimbabwe through normal banking channels with effect from October 1, 2016.
Mangudya said he had secured $20m for Fidelity Printers and Refiners to support small-scale and artisanal mining operations in order to increase gold production in the country, with underground gold reserves estimated to be around 13 million tonnes.
He said only 586 tonnes have been officially mined over the past 36 years.
The lender of last resort boss proposed a $10m horticulture and floriculture pre- and post-shipment facility to increase production and exports of the subsector and will be disbursed through the normal banking channels.
The Export Credit Guarantee Company would be resuscitated to increase small and medium enterprises production by the beginning of next month, Mangudya said.
He urged microfinance institutions to reduce their monthly lending rates by half to 10%.
Meanwhile, the banking sector aggregate core capital increased by 5,80% to $1,04bn as at June 2016 due to improved earnings from $982,50m as at December 2015.
Total banking sector deposits increased by 5,2% to $5,9bn during the first half of 2016, compared to $5,6bn in December 2015.
- Newsday