Story by Farai Gwaze
ZIMBABWE’s industry is embracing global quality to broaden regional and international markets.
The 10th Edition of the National Annual Quality Awards, organised by the Standards Association of Zimbabwe (SAZ), were held on Friday night and created a platform for industry representatives to focus on increasing the market share of Zimbabwean products in the SADC region.
Standards Association of Zimbabwe acting director general, Mr Comsos Mukoyi said the awards aimed to align the country with developments made in adoption of the African Free Continental Trade Agreement with regards to high quality standards.
“Zimbabwe as a country has signed several trade agreements, so we are following in the footsteps to ensure that with the trade agreements at SADC level, we support those with harmonised standards, so that at least goods can freely move within the region,” he said.
The Deputy Minister of Industry and Commerce, Honourable Roy Bhila said the awards are an acknowledgement of quality and excellence of standards met by Zimbabwean companies across all sectors both locally and regionally.
“So, this is going to be a very big Improvement in terms of products. Whoever is going to win an award here is the one who’s going to represent our country at national level and definitely they are going to win because you can see that our guys are so active and they are doing a wonderful job. Lastly, what I can comment in my view is that going forward, we need to have a policy that will make us as Zimbabweans own the whole value chain in terms of CBCA and SAZ. As I speak now from what I’ve researched, we’re only getting 20 percent of the revenue and we should get 100 percent of the revenue coming to us. That is going to make the agenda of the President to be a reality,” said Hon Bhila.
The National Annual Quality Awards recognise organisations that excel in the quality of goods and services.
