Unable to get their hands on scarce and often expensive essentials, Zimbabweans are settling for food items such as cooking oil that are cheap, often substandard, and sometimes dangerous, that are now flooding the informal markets.

"We are worried by the presence of unhygienic and substandard foodstuffs on the market, particularly in the black market," said Rosemary Siyachitema, executive director of the Consumer Council of Zimbabwe (CCZ), a watchdog body.

"Our observation is that there is an acute shortage of commodities on the formal market, and the informal sector is taking advantage of that to sell the goods to consumers, who have little choice."

Business is booming for Jane Mushape, an informal trader in the capital, Harare, where almost all basic commodities, including cooking oil, are in short supply or unobtainable. She sells homemade cooking oil supplied by another informal trader, who presses the oil out of groundnuts in a shack in his backyard.

Customers do not seem to mind the somewhat smelly, reddish cooking oil sold in unhygienic recycled containers, and Mushape sells all her stock every day.

But one of her regular customers, unemployed Theresa Machirori, suffered a near tragedy recently when, after using the oil for cooking, her entire family had to be hospitalised.

"The doctor told me that we were lucky to have survived because the cooking oil contained poison," Machirori told IRIN. "The home-made cooking oil is generally cheaper than standard products that one can also buy from the black market, and that is what forces us to buy from her."

Pennywise

Machirori's attempts to economise have boomeranged: the hospital refused to release her family until a relative intervened to ensure that the US$200 medical fee would be paid. "But God knows where I am going to get that money from [to pay the hospital]," lamented Machirori. She cannot even claim compensation from Mushape because the trader is unregistered.

Illicit beer, known as "chikokiyana", which has a very high alcohol content and is often prepared with untreated water, also poses a major health risk but is doing brisk business.

Regular police raids have not dampened the trade. "We attend to a sudden death cases almost on a weekly basis after individuals have taken too much of the illicit brew, which they always drink undiluted," said a policeman who refused to be named.

The CCZ's Siyachitema warned, "Obviously, when goods are sold on the black market, those who operate it are not bound by any business guidelines and ethics, a situation that puts consumers at the mercy of informal traders. We urge consumers to be aware of their rights ... we would want them to scrutinise whatever they are buying or, ideally, stop buying foodstuffs that are not inspected."

The consumer body is planning hold a workshop with other stakeholders later this year to find ways to stem the trade in substandard commodities.

Price control

Zimbabwe's economy has been in freefall: it now has the world's highest inflation rate - around 6,500 percent - while foreign exchange and fuel shortages have diminished the manufacturing sector; unable to afford the high operational costs, many businesses have closed down.

Shortages of basic foodstuffs and essential items worsened in June, when the Zimbabwean government forced manufacturers to cut prices by 50 percent in an attempt to reduce inflation. Manufacturers chose to either close down or reduce production, worsening the shortages.

After widespread objections by business, the government made some upward revisions of controlled prices in August, but the move has failed to boost supplies, as the cost of manufacturing is still too high.

Most shops now import commodities from neighbouring countries, particularly South Africa and Botswana, but because they have to source foreign currency on the black market to buy the goods, the items are expensive when sold locally. The Zimbabwean dollar is currently trading at around Z$500,000 to US$1 on the parallel market.