Tuesday, September 17, 2019

ED, Belarus Envoy Hold Crucial Talks
17 SEP, 2019 - 00:09

President Mnangagwa welcomes Belarusian Chief of Presidential Affairs General Colonel Victor Sheiman at State House in Harare yesterday. — Picture: Tawanda Mudimu

Zvamaida Murwira
Senior Reporter
Zimbabwe Herald

President Mnangagwa and Belarusian Chief of Presidential Affairs General Colonel Victor Sheiman yesterday held crucial talks to assess progress on investment opportunities which are set to transform Zimbabwe into the region’s transport and logistical hub.

The Head of State and Government and Commander-in-Chief of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces (ZDF) held a three-hour-long meeting with Gen Col Sheiman at State House that was attended by three Cabinet Ministers and representatives of other ministries.

Gen Col Sheiman’s visit follows President Mnangagwa’s trip to Belarus in January this year where they discussed investment opportunities in agriculture, mining, energy, transport and construction, among other areas.

President Mnangagwa and his Belarusian counterpart, President Alexander Lukashenko, sealed eight agreements and advanced a grand infrastructure scheme that could make Zimbabwe a regional transport and logistics hub.

Briefing journalists yesterday, President Mnangagwa said discussions sought to reflect on progress registered to date on the investment areas whose effect would be to deepen bilateral relations between the two countries.

“Gen Col Sheiman has come over to review the progress so far achieved. We have gone over all the items which we agreed on when I visited Belarus in January. It is work in progress on almost every area, but it is up to you to ask him,” said President Mnangagwa while responding to Press enquiries on what they had discussed.

Gen Col Sheiman said their discussions centred on how they could set up a solar-powered energy
generation that had the capacity to produce 100 megawatts.

“One other issue we discussed is on the energy sector. We have a task to create an energy generation company. This company will have a solar power plant. The power station will have the capacity of 100MW and will be installed 40 kilometres from Harare. This company will be engaged in transmitting electricity and distributing equipment,” said Gen Col Sheiman.

He said the company would also be involved in road construction and other infrastructure.

“It will be one of the biggest construction companies. According to instruction from President Mnangagwa we are going into agriculture which will be a joint venture between Zimbabwe and Belarus,” he said.

On transport, Gen Col Sheiman said they intend to have a joint venture for the movement of cargo.

“It (joint venture) will be involved in moving cargo in Zimbabwe and Southern African countries. It will transport cargo from seaports in Mozambique to Zimbabwe, providing transport services from Zimbabwe to seaports of Mozambique. We will then include this network of Zambia, Botswana and South Africa. Second stage is the creation of biggest logistic centre to facilitate the work of this company, this logistic centre will convert into dry seaport of Zimbabwe,” he said.

On agriculture, Gen Col Sheiman said Zimbabwe and Belarus would enter into a joint venture on production of wheat, corn, maize and soya beans and explore ways to increase milk production and processing of the milk.

He said they intend to secure a 10 000 ha piece of land for agricultural production.

“In this place we will also have poultry and poultry meat which will be large scale production. There will also be chicken and eggs. There will also be production of beef and milk, from the Belarus we will supply livestock, we will produce cows and buffaloes. We will increase the production of milk, the next thing is to install processing facility of milk for internal Zimbabwean market. We have a task from President Mnangagwa to produce low cost beef and milk for the internal market of Zimbabwe,” he said.

The meeting was attended by Ministers Mthuli Ncube (Finance and Economic Development), Winston Chitando (Mines and Mining Development), Sibusiso Moyo (Foreign Affairs and International Trade).

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