Tinaani Nyabereka
Gweru – With Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (Zimstats) expressing its readiness last week to conduct the 2022 population census scheduled to start on April 21, 2022,Minister for Provincial Affairs and Devolution for Midlands province Larry Mavima has said the census results are critical to the devolution agenda.
Addressing Level 2 supervisors at a training workshop conducted at Midlands State University (MSU) campus last week, Mavima said census results were key to the agenda as funds disbursed to local authorities are based on a formula that takes population into account.
“As a province and nation as a whole, census results are key in our devolution agenda to inform the equitable sharing of resources and revenues as guided by the population profiles, poverty profiles and infrastructure quality. Devolution funds are disbursed to local authorities as provided for by the
population. Accordingly our 14 local authorities in the Midlands province can assess their fiscal capacities after knowing the total population in their areas of jurisdiction.
“Let me hasten to say that our National Development Strategy (NSD) 1 2021-2025, His Excellency the President Emmerson Mnangagwa has targeted a cumulative of 220 000 housing units which you and I are set, guided and planned using census results. In order to achieve our NDS1 thrust of transforming lives through accelerated, inclusive and result- based economic growth and development, is a need for evidence based planning by making use of census and other surveys data from Zimstats. Accordingly our Midlands Provincial Economic Development Plan (MPEDP) relies much on economic data provided by the same organisation.
‘In support of the Zimbabwe is Open for Business Mantra’, Zimstats has provided enough data for our Provincial Economic Development Profile. The profile highlights the potential for the province and gives necessary support to potential investors,” he said.
He further said provincial and district economists were going to work closely with Zimstats.
“Furthermore with the devolved structures, each province has the mandate to calculate its own Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita which is the total Provincial GDP divided by the total provincial population as analysed by each province.
“The GDP together with figures helps in assessing the living standards of our people across the province for the year 2020 Midlands had a GDP of ZWL 130.2 billion and the GDP per Capita of 65 400. I would like to applaud Zimstats for the timeous release of this data,” added Mavima.
Meanwhile people who gathered as level 2 supervisors came from eight districts in the province from various clusters of the security and government departments among other sectors.
