Zim Collects 0.4% of Targeted Donor Funds_Zimbabwe collected just $3 million from foreign donors in the first quarter, or 0.4 percent of its annual target, weakening the country´s efforts to rebuild the economy.

The government had estimated it would receive $810 million from donors to fund its $2.2 billion budget this year, Finance Minister Tendai Biti said in an interview in Abidjan, the commercial capital of Ivory Coast, yesterday.

Zimbabwe, which has outstanding arrears of $1.2 billion to the International Monetary Fund, African Development Bank and World Bank.

“There are genuine questions that are raised when I speak to donors: the credibility and legitimacy of the government, will it last and will it deliver on the things it agreed it will do,” Biti said.

Biti said he is in “serious discussions” with South African authorities and expects to announce new lines of credit in the second half of the year. The government has also had talks with China, South Korea and its traditional donors, such as Germany and the Nordic countries, he added.

Zimbabwe is working towards meeting requirements set by the IMF and World Bank to qualify as a Heavily Indebted Poor Country, with the aim of having its debt cancelled, Biti said. To do that, the country needs “macroeconomic soundness,” he said.

“We’ve made much, much progress, in a very short period of time,” Biti said. “Almost miraculous progress. If you’re going to reduce inflation from 500 billion percent to minus 7.7 percent, it’s unprecedented. But there hasn’t been a corresponding positive reaction to the positive energy we’ve generated.”

Zimbabwe’s economic growth will probably reach almost 7 percent this year, up from a previous forecast of 4.8 percent, Biti said.