Story by Kenias Chivuzhe
The Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZIMSTAT) says preparations for the country’s first-ever economic census set for next year, are on course, with the mapping exercise having been completed.
The ground work for the country to hold the first-ever economic census is moving according to plan, with ZIMSTAT revealing that the end of the mapping exercise has paved way for the listing exercise.
In an interview with ZBC News in Mutare this Tuesday, ZIMSTAT Director General Tafadzwa Bandama gave a scope of the envisaged economic census preparation processes.
“The agency is undertaking the issue of economic census which is the first of its kind in the country as we aim to establish a business register so that we know the number of companies in the country. The informal sector and other SMEs are operating in the country so we want to know the structure of the economy. We hear various figures describing the structure of the country and some figures say about 65 percent of the economy is informal but after this survey we will know the true structure of the economy. So far we have completed mapping and now we are going towards listing the companies that are in the enumeration areas. After listing we are going to carry out the input and output survey beginning 2025.In April we will collect data on SMEs and the Informal sector. Then in 2026 we are going to collect data on large corporates of the economy,” he said.
Bandama also spoke on the drive by ZIMSTAT to modernised operations to meet international best practices.
“We are currently working on modernising ZIMSTAT so that it can be benchmarked to international standards. We want to ensure the human resources and the business environment is conducive to producing statistics in the country. We are doing this in order to ensure that the statistics that we produce inspire confidence among the stakeholders. We are also working towards modernising the institution so that we are able to deliver on the mandate of ZIMSTAT and perform to the expectation of our stakeholders,” he added.
It also emerged that the ZIMSTAT Household Budget Survey is half-way through and expected to be completed by 2026.
