Govt warns traders against Rand pricing

Bame Piet | Thursday May 26, 2016 16:11

 

“One of the Action items from the previous HLCC was for the Ministry of Investment Trade and Industry and Business Botswana to check on Traders and Retailers who were simply sticking the Pula price over the numerically identical Rand price.” 

Khama said that the exchange rate between the two currencies fluctuated between 1.32 and 1.40 Rand to a Pula during recently and therefore the practice is not playing fair with Batswana consumers. 

“I am happy to report that the Ministry has been visiting traders and retailers and cautioning them, after declaring this to be an 'Unfair Trading' practice.  I trust that Business Botswana has cautioned the Business Community accordingly.  The Pula price over the identical Rand price appears to be no longer visible,” he said.

He warned that action would be taken against traders and retailers who continue doing that. 

Meanwhile the President said that the global economic activity remained unresponsive and that an uneven recovery is expected to continue in advanced economies while growth in emerging markets and developing economies continues to decline. 

“In relation to our local economy, the economic recovery has been challenged. GDP growth turned slightly negative in 2015 owing to a decline in the global demand for diamonds and copper. Though the non-mining activities such as Trade, Transport and Communications and Financial and Business Services recorded positive growth over the year, this growth was mitigated owing to negative growth from mining activity, a regional drought, and electricity and water challenges,” he said.

Diamond sales have picked up in recent months and there is cautious optimism in this regard, he added.  Khama told the HLCC that the IMF forecast that Botswana will recover from the mild contraction in 2015 and will average growth of 4.3% a year from 2016 to 2020. 

Amid the confusion in economic growth, inflation has remained low at around three percent which is at the lower end of the targeted range of 3-6 percent, partly due to the effect of a firm Pula exchange rate against a volatile and weakened Rand.

He said that the Economic Stimulus Programme (ESP) was adopted to address prevailing unemployment and its implementation is on-going.

“Ministries are working tirelessly to ensure that the Programme is successfully implemented and we rely on the Private Sector to join hands with Government in implementing the Programme,” he said.