Zimbabwe Absurdity

Peter is an old boss of mine. Well, I guess I should qualify that; he was an owning director in the company where I worked so we didn’t come into contact that much but he did own the farm where I lived. More of a businessman than a farmer he is retired now and farming! Though it is more market gardening to keep him occupied.

He comes to the nursery on occasion to stock up on vegetables and glean information from me. Being the sharp businessman that he was (and still is I suppose) he is useful to me too. Yesterday he told me that the cash for cash rate (Zim dollars for US dollars) was around 250 million whereas the transfer rate (no “cash” involved) was at least 350 million and climbing as we spoke. I digested this for a while and decided that our pricing was way behind as usual but I needed to do something about it. A Zimbabwe solution was called for! So yesterday evening I pushed our non-cash (which in this country means cheques – cards are not that widely used) to the equivalent of 300 million to the US and put a discount of 20% for cash into the computer. It also helps get cash in as we need to pay wages next week. I must go and see how it is working out…