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Buy Zim engages communities

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Vandudzai Zirebwa Buy Zimbabwe
Since its inception, Buy Zimbabwe has strived to address imbalances on the local market that gave foreign products preference over local products. According to figures released by the National statistics agency (Zim-Stats) in July, Zimbabwe imported goods worth $3,6 billion from January to July 2015 and exported goods worth $1,4 billion leaving the country in a trade deficit of $2,2 billion.

The continued ballooning of the trade deficit is one the leading symptoms of the looming economic quagmire. Unless some drastic measures are taken to reverse this adverse trend, the country is likely to continue seeing a rising private sector debt and some biting liquidity crunch and the ever decreasing propensity to create jobs.

Apart from the lobbying and policy formulation representation that Buy Zimbabwe offers to its partners, it has become increasingly important for Buy Zimbabwe to engage consumers in order to initiate a mindset and expenditure behaviour change in favour of local goods and services.

A significant number of local consumers still prefer imports for numerous reasons chief among them the price differentials, packaging and in some instances the perception that imports are of a better quality than local goods, a factor which is not necessarily true. The Buy Zimbabwe community engagement campaign that was held on August 26 2015 in Sunningdale and the second engagement held on September 2 2015 in Highfield and Machipisa have unearthed numerous concerns that consumers have regarding buying local.

The campaign which kicked off in Sunningdale and Machipisa saw hundreds of residents gathering at the community halls to understand why it is important to support locally manufactured goods and services and the role that our communities can play in job creation, wealth creation and increasing national pride.

Though, price is a function of cost, it has been cited as the leading inhibitor of local preference, sadly the prices are higher because of mainly high utility costs and the ever depreciating ZAR, factors that will likely hamper us for a longer period to come.

Buy Zimbabwe has launched this campaign after the realisation that many members of the society were not fully aware of the impact that a simple purchasing decision can have on job creation and ultimately economic growth. It was observed that for many consumers, purchasing patterns were influenced by perception. Many perceive foreign products to be of better quality and better value, which is not necessarily true.

It is against this background that Buy Zimbabwe saw it fit to take its several partners in the manufacturing, retail and service industry to the communities and demystify these myths in order to achieve behavioural change. However, in doing so, Buy Zimbabwe is not advocating for blind loyalty to local products. These dialogue sessions are designed to be open platforms where consumers are able to express clearly some of the factors that deter them from buying local.

The meetings in Sunningdale and Machipisa proved that there is indeed an information gap between business and consumers. However, it was also apparent that this scenario can easily be remedied through open dialogue. The discussions in Sunningdale and Highfield, which were moderated by popular talk show hosts Amai Rebecca Chisamba and Tilda Moyo, respectively, gave community members the opportunity to dissect the various issues they had with local products.

Many of the participants indicated that while they have a strong desire to support local products and understand the importance of doing so they are forced by their financial circumstances to opt for the cheaper foreign imports, a phenomenon that is very real. However, it was made clear to participants that in order to help our industry to fully recover, it is important for consumers to look at the long term benefits of bearing the steep prices for now.

The activations are aimed at creating an engagement platform for Buy Zimbabwe and its partners to educate consumers on the real and urgent need for them to increase consumption of local products. It is hoped that at the end of the community engagement drive and the in-store activations, which will run until 16 December country wide, Buy Zimbabwe will have made inroads in inculcating an in-depth understanding of buying local notwithstanding other macro and micro challenges that still makes it difficult for ordinary consumers to buy local goods, at least in some instances.

email, vandudzai@buyzimbabwe.co.zw


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