Zimbabwe: Construction Industry Federation of Zimbabwe (CIFOZ).
“Do you know what time means to a builder?” Garwe asked after this writer arrived at Conquenar House, the venue of the interview, about 10 minutes late. “I have very little time in the office. I have to be out there…on the site,” said Garwe, who heads a construction
company. To him and anyone who is serious about being in the construction industry, time management makes a whole world of difference. And as president of CIFOZ, he believes his job and that of the team he leads is to ensure that high professional standards are kept.
Garwe says his team’s vision is to see not only cranes returning to the skies, but for Zimbabwean companies to be regional players as well.
CIFOZ VISION
“Our vision is to ensure that the construction industry becomes relevant to all the sectors in the turnabout of this country’s economy. We would also want to ensure that the industry is run professionally by the professionals who actually do the job.”
CIFOZ is a non-profit contractor's association formed in1915. It has more than 350 members in a diversity of building, civil engineering and specialist contractor trades.
The construction industry is considered the heart of any country’s economy, and the soundness of that economy is measured by the number of cranes in its skyline. For some years now, even Harare—the capital of Zimbabwe—has had no crane towering over its skies, a sign of bad times that all hope has gone away for good.
To find out more about what is happening to the construction industry in Zimbabwe, Construction Review’s Cyril Zenda spoke to Daniel Garwe, the president of the Construction Industry Federation of Zimbabwe (CIFOZ).
“We want to ensure CIFOZ becomes a regional player. For the past 30 years or so we have focused ourselves mainly on local industry because at independence we inherited a closed economy where the government was involved in a lot of infrastructure development which kept most of our members occupied, but you can see what happens when the government is unable to finance the projects anymore. We have started making forays beyond our borders, starting with the region,” said Garwe, a Quantity Surveyor and Chartered builder who has more than 20 years construction industry hands-on experience under his belt.
To this end, CIFOZ, a member of the Contractor Development Organisations in Africa and other developing countries of the world in October last year signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with sister regional organisations that would enable Zimbabwean contractors to do some work in the region.
Garwe said as a result of this MoU and subsequent follow-up meetings, already a number of companies are benefiting as some of them are doing some work in some neighbouring countries.
The organisation is holding discussions with the government and a number of private players so that they can underwrite contractors who are trying to do business outside the country.
CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY IS A CASH COW
Highlighting the importance of the construction industry as an export sector, Garwe said while it might take, say, 100 tobacco farmers about year to earn the country about 10 million USD in foreign exchange, one construction company can bring in more than double that much in less the time. “With the construction industry, we are talking about big figures, that is why we are talking to government and other players so that they can underwrite our members who would want to sojourn into the region.”
Zimbabwe’s exports depend on tobacco and minerals, and the government and private players in the financial services sectors are always seen as favouring these sectors when it comes to issues of funding and guarantees.
CHALLENGES
Garwe said as the country eases out of the economic challenges the biggest challenge the Zimbabwean construction industry faced was not a shortage of projects, but the unavailability of funding, as there were hundreds of projects already tendered out to contractors that had been mothballed for a very long time because of lack of funding. These projects, both in the public and private sector ranged from dams, roads, schools, universities, airports, hospitals as well as houses among a host of others.
Among the many projects that are expected to give a huge impetus to the Zimbabwean construction industry is the dualisation of the 900km highway from Beitbridge to Chirundu, from the border with South Africa on the south and Zambia on the north is expected to chew up to 1 billion USD. The road,is to be financed by the private sectors under the BOT basis, and several contractors would work on certain stretches of the road.
“In fact once funding becomes available for all these projects, Zimbabwe will run short of contractors.” He said with the country’s land reform programme there would be increased demand for infrastructure development as roads, schools, clinics, tobacco barns and such other infrastructure have to be built in previously remote areas.
Garwe said also resulting from the challenge of funding is the problem of serious under-capitalisation that all CIFOZ members have to grapple with. “For about ten years now, our members have been unable to replace obsolete plant and equipment and have to find lines of credit to finance this recapitalisation. Unfortunately most players in the local financial sector are also undercapitalised themselves.”
The CIFOZ president said for their vision to be realised, the industry would have to rebuild on its skills base, starting with the retention of the available workforce, training more skills as well as luring back some of the thousands who have gone abroad in search of greener pastures.
At its peak in the late 1990s the construction industry in Zimbabwe employed close to 150 000, but that figure has since dwindled to way below 30 000 as capacity utilisation fellow to about 15 percent.
Garwe said CIFOZ is also actively involved in affirmative action to support women who have decided to mock the formbook by venturing into this once male-only domain. There are already several female contractors operating in the country
CIFOZ also has programmes to deal with HIV and AIDS and encourages it members to adhere strictly to internationally accepted occupational, health and safety guidelines.
Garwe says a career in construction is not just challenging but exciting as well because the work involve transforming dreams and ideas—some seemingly wild—into physical existence.
