Comparison to China

Just like Zimbabwe, China also experienced an economic crisis. For Zimbabwe this economic crisis was caused by colonization, independence and a bad leadership. For China, the economic crisis started after World War 2 when the country was influenced by communist beliefs and also because of bad leadership. China was ruled by Mao Zedong at the time, who was the leader of the Chinese Communist Party. The economic crisis started by Mao’s attempt to change China from an agrarian society to a modern and industrial one in a time span of 5 years. He encouraged farmers to produce steel so that China did not have to rely on imports for steel and machinery. However, this did not work out because they were not trained and the steel produced was unusable. This created low productivity in steel. Also, because most of the farmers were forced to do steel production, not a lot of people were farming therefore causing the greatest famine and environmental problems. Everyone was poor and no one could afford anything creating no flow of economy. To worsen the economy even more, Mao Zedong created a new set of policies under the name cultural revolution. He used the nation’s youth to purge the “impure” elements of the Chinese society causing chaos and the destruction of culture and education. The economic crisis of China ended when Mao died and Deng Xiao Ping took over, changing the policies of China by opening it up to foreign relations and changing the country to a market economy. Since this change, China has improved to being one of the most developed and important country in the world. 

 

Mao Zedong. Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e8/Mao_Zedong_portrait.jpg

Zimbabwe's situation is actually quite similar to China. Both countries had a leader with ideologies that is leading towards an authoritarian government. Both leaders, Mao Zedong and Robert Mugabe had ideas to “improve” the countries in 5 years but both failing because of their idea of isolationism as an advantage for their country, and their lack of foreign relations. However, China is now a very well-developed country with trading partners all around the world acting as a huge manufacturer. Its GDP growth is constant and developing, with a GDP of 9.24 trillion USD (2013) and a GDP per capita of 6,807 USD (2013). This is way higher than Zimbabwe because unlike Zimbabwe, China has experienced a turning point that changed its economy from stagnation to ongoing development. To get to the level China is at, Zimbabwe also needs a change in leadership and policies. It needs to open up to the world more and should allow foreign influences that will eventually increase the development and growth in Zimbabwe. This way, the economic crisis in Zimbabwe will end and the country's high potential and expectations will finally be met.