South African products march into Zimbabwe

It's a “Proudly South African” product, the advertisement informs, adding a few more details: no glucuronolactone, best-tasting, maximum energy and best-priced.

But just how unlimited becomes the question after the trendy youths imitating the American hip-hop culture – young men and boys wearing oversized pants, big boots, with plaited hair or headgear, and young women dressed in hipsters and tight-fitting jeans pants – suddenly trigger a bout of demand.

“You won't like the drink's taste the first time you take it,” a young woman told BizCommunity at a shopping centre. “But it's OK, I like it,” she says, holding two cans.

A crackdown on retailers and manufacturers to force prices down has caused substantial shortages in the country, resulting in empty supermarket shelves.

Most local manufacturers have cut production or stopped completely, while retailers are also unwilling to order new stock from local manufacturers for goods under the government's controlled prices list, fearing they could pick up huge loses. But the inadequate supply of most local products has led to imported products finding their way onto the Zimbabwean market, particularly in the up-market suburbs with the well-to-do, and, ironically, most of Zimbabwe's cabinet ministers behind the clampdown.

The supermarkets in the suburbs – often referred to as the Northern Suburbs – are well stocked, but mostly with products from South Africa. The imports range from jams and cereals through to cool drinks and juices, and much else.

Some of the products are finding their way from as far as Europe and Asia, like a range of juices from Agricultural Marketing in Bangladesh.

There is a growing fear among marketers the current crisis could result in Zimbabwean products losing their domestic market share to South African imports.

For example, even when local laundry soap is available in the supermarkets, Zimbabweans now prefer the South African product as price controls and lack of critical inputs has resulted in a marked deterioration in the quality of locally produced goods.

A retailer, speaking on condition of anonymity said no pricing concerns had been expressed yet by the government on imported products.

The imports are priced much higher than the domestic products, apparently the price being based on the parallel market exchange rate and not the official rate, indicating that most of the product suppliers are sourcing their foreign currency from the parallel market.

A 275ml 911 Smart Energy Drink, for example, costs ZW$180 000, equivalent to R6 using the parallel market rate or ZAR5 294 using the unrealistic official exchange rate. If the same drink were produced locally, it would be around ZW$30 000 or R1 or R882 using the official exchange rate.