Zimbabwe’s currency ‘curse’ and the economic malaise

2020-05-18

Zimbabwe has been plagued by currency problems. In June 2019 the government banned the multicurrency system and reintroduced the defunct Zimbabwean dollar. The move was intended to address the fast-deteriorating economic crisis and bring sanity to foreign currency supply and demand, in a broader context of economic and political failure. This policy brief discusses Zimbabwe’s currency crisis and its implications for macroeconomic stabilisation.

About the author

Keith Jefferis is a consultant in the Peace Operations and Peacebuilding programme of the Institute for Security Studies. He is a former deputy governor of the Bank of Botswana and an expert on monetary policy.

Picture: Amelia Broodryk/ISS