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Tonnes and Tonnes of Gold is being Lost through Smuggling

iconJul 17, 2014 21:24
Source:SMM
Recent reports say that gold loss due to smuggling and underground dealings is increasing in a considerable rate, especially in Zimbabwe.

Author: Paul Ploumis17 Jul 2014 Last updated at 06:25:18 GMT

HARARE (Scrap Monster): Recent reports say that gold loss due to smuggling and underground dealings is increasing in a considerable rate, especially in Zimbabwe.

It has been stated in an unofficial note by a private citizen that the Zimbabwe is losing its gold worth $800 million every month. The document has been passed to Vice President Joice Mujuru, Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa, several other ministries, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

The country is now facing acute cash depletion and a debt of about $9.9 billion.

Investigator says that many unnamed cabinet ministers and senior government officials are also involved in several cases. They do deals in a shady way with officials and unauthorized gold miners who do not remit the mineral to the government through Fidelity Printers as needed by the law.

As per reported smuggling, most of gold is smuggled out of the nation where it gets prices greater than Fidelity offers.

The source said that 99.9 pct of gold sales in the nation were now transacted in hard cash, without any of ist finding its way into banking system.

He added that everything is traded illegally outside the country with all support from several senior governmental officials and profits are externalized.

Zimbabwe is the nation which has more than thousand registered artisanal gold miners and it employs about 500,000 people. The investigator suspects that a high number from this are illegally selling the bullions.

One sources added that the some of the purchase includes order quantities between 50 kg to 90kg of processed gold on a daily basis.

According to Zimbabwe Artisanal Miners and Small Scale Council, the official gold production decreased to just above 900kg in 2013 from 17 tonnes produced in 2004. The council also stated that smuggling was in a rampant way due to the higher prices in other nations.

Most of the illegal panners in the nations sited on disused mines and on the Great Dyke, the investigator added.

ZAMSC board member and former cabinet minister, Paul Mangwana said that low prices offered by Fidelity are the key factor for the gold smuggling in the nation. He added that they are losing tones and tonne of their gold and it was going to South Africa, where the dealers buy at 5 pct above the present world price.

 

 

Gold
gold price
global gold demand
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gold smuggling
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