14 November 1997 – dubbed “Black Friday”- is a day that will forever be etched in Zimbabwe`s economic history as the cataclysmic point that triggered Zimbabwe`s economic free-fall. Below is a brief chronicle of the events leading up to this seminal day, and what ensued in the aftermaths of Black Friday. In the second decade of its independence, the Zimbabwean government launched an economic reform programme essential in liberalizing the economy and dealing with the structural impediments to growth. However, fiscal policy was weak and monetary policy unsteady during the time period; and the country suffered from two serious droughts (in 1992 and 1995), which affected Zimbabwe’s agriculture, its primary economic industry. A land reform had been a highly contentious issue since independence, as the majority of prime agricultural land was owned by about 4,000 white commercial farmers; while the indigenous population continued to engage in subsistence farming. In the first five y...
Economics, Business and Finance
Comments
Post a Comment