THE Zimbabwe Stock Exchange (ZSE) has launched an umbrella body to be the voice of the sector.
The body, Capital Markets Association, was launched on Monday during the inaugural Capital Markets Conference in Nyanga.
ZSE chief executive officer Justin Bgoni said the association included the exchanges, depositories, stockbrokers, custodians, asset managers, and transfer secretaries.
“So, all the major players that are in the capital markets. And what we want to do is we want to do an association similar to what the Confederation of Zimbabwe Industries has done to manufacturing. It does several things. The first thing that it does is it helps in terms of research,” he said.
“So, you’d research matters that pertain to the capital markets. The second thing is it lobbies, so whenever there’s a policy that it wants that is beneficial to the members or something that the government does that’s not beneficial to the members, they lobby as one voice, that’s an important component of what they do.”
Bgoni added that there would also be an element of professional development as well.
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“So, when you’re in a market like this, you can start teaching members on the best practice. That’s going to be a major part of what’s going to happen as well. I think those are the main things of what’s going to happen,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Securities and Exchange Commission of Zimbabwe (SecZim) also launched the #MySchool Corporate Social Responsibility project, aimed at raising financial literacy and capital market awareness among primary and secondary school students across Zimbabwe.
The initiative began on April 1 and is expected to run until November 31 this year, in an effort to empower the next generation in knowledge of how to participate in the capital markets.
“One of the key challenges identified by SecZim is the low awareness of the capital markets in Zimbabwe, which is currently estimated at 2%. This low level of financial literacy and capital market knowledge hinders participation in the capital market,” SecZim said following the launch of the initiative.
“In response, SecZim aims to raise capital market awareness in all provinces of Zimbabwe through collaborative efforts with key stakeholders.”
The #MySchool CSR project will leverage the “Capital Market Toolkit”, which contains supplementary learning material.
This learning material is approved by the curriculum development unit of the Primary and Secondary Education ministry and strategic partnerships to achieve its objectives.
SECZim said it will engage individuals from both the public and private sectors to encourage their participation in capital market outreach programs targeted at their former schools.
SECZim will also encourage corporates, non-governmental organisations and other bodies to choose the schools of their choice in the outreach programme.
The two-day Capital Markets Conference that began on Monday drew all the major players in capital markets and was co-organised by the Zimbabwe Independent, ZSE and SecZim.
Zimbabwe Independent is one of three publications under the private media house, Alpha Media Holdings, alongside NewsDay and The Standard. The media house also owns broadcaster, HStv.