Reversing Zimbabwe’s ten-year, devastating self-inflicted economic decline is going to be a Herculean task. Output in agriculture, mining and manufacturing, formal sector employment and real incomes have halved since President Robert Mugabe launched in 1997 his “100 per cent empowerment drive”.

Inflation is in the region of 40m per cent, there has been sweeping dollarisation of the economy, the currency has that collapsed in the last week alone from Z$7,000 to the pound to Z$60 000, and a creaking infrastructure functions only spasmodically. Social service delivery has all but collapsed and empty shops and factories operating at less than 20 per cent of capacity bear testimony to the still-ruling Zanu-PF’s economic legacy.