Zimbabwe's biggest economic problem, stratospheric inflation, has been all but halted since hard currencies, such as the US dollar, were allowed.

Finance Minister Biti said there was no return in sight for the Zimbawean dollar - despite calls from President Mugabe and the central bank for its return. He said he could not see it coming back before 2012, the BBC reported.

Biti said government revenues were improving from about $4m in March to $90m in June. Despite the improvement, total revenues for the March-to-October period were $685m, below the government's estimate of $789.8m.

Some think the government's estimate of 7% growth next year is way too optimistic.
"We still expect a slight contraction and next year's number will be highly dependent on the political developments," said Christie Viljoen, an economist at NKC Independent Economists.

The International Monetary Fund however predicts an expansion of 6%.
This would be in sharp contrast to the rest of this decade's performance. The International Monetary Fund estimated that during the years of President Robert Mugabe's policy of reallocating land at the start of the decade, the economy shrank by more than 40%.