RBZ to unveil long waited coins

The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe will today unveil special coins that will help ease the problem of change in the economy.

Availability of the coins is expected to result in the reduction in prices of commodities as most prices had been priced to the next dollar.

RBZ spokesperson Alson Mufiri told the Herald Business yesterday that the Governor John Mangudya will unveil the special coins to journalists.

A total of R25 million coins and $20 million minted coins have been imported from South Africa, according to the central bank. The $20 million special coins will be at par with United States Dollars.

They will be in denominations 1 cent, 5 cents, 10 cents, 25 cents and 50 cents.

RBZ governor John Mangudya said the coins would help the small and medium enterprises to transact more than before as they will be having smaller denominations. Mangudya said the central bank would soon launch a public awareness campaign on the new coins.

An estimated 75% of the population is engaged in the informal sector mostly in the trading and vending businesses.
Many small products were being priced at a $1 or 5 rand due to the unavailability of coins in the economy. Zimbabwe introduced the multi-currency system in 2009.

The country was coming out of a hyper-inflationary environment and a decade of lost opportunities. The adoption of the multi-currency regime did not come cheap as the country did not have coins with notes being used for all transactions.