Online Reporter
Martin Kadzere, [email protected]
LOCAL bus manufacturer AVM Africa’s capacity utilisation has dropped to between 5 and 10 percent, weighed down by weak demand emanating from an influx of imports, managing director Mr Jacob Kupa has said.
AVM Africa has the infrastructure to produce 25 commuter buses per month, but the country’s oldest and largest bus manufacturing plant is operating at a fraction of its installed capacity due to cheap imports.
Mr Kupa acknowledged that while the duty-free Statutory Instrument was good for the increased availability of imported buses, drives competition and lowers travel costs for passengers, it had left local manufacturers highly vulnerable and unable to compete with low-cost imports.
This revelation comes ahead of the inaugural Zimbabwe Industrialisation Conference & Expo (ZICE 2026), scheduled for July 23–24 at the HICC in Harare, which will bring all issues affecting the domestic industry under the spotlight.
Organised by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce in partnership with think tank Africa Economic Development Strategies (AEDS) and ZimTrade, ZICE 2026 aims to fast-track Zimbabwe’s transition to a competitive manufacturing economy.
In that context, Mr Kupa noted that the current operational challenges in the automobile industry underscore the need for closer policy coordination to safeguard and support the country’s industrialisation drive.
“A special instrument that came out about three months ago says buses for transporting people are now duty-free,” Mr Kupa said. “Once they remove duty, it basically means that we remain very vulnerable.
“It makes it very difficult for us to compete.”
The scenario has seen private transport operators completely bypass local manufacturing capacity.
Private bus operators intend to import 700 buses for local routes, with an initial batch of 200 units already en route from foreign suppliers. Because bus manufacturing is highly capital-intensive, AVM operates strictly on an order-by-order basis.
Mr Kupa said that without confirmed off-takers, production stalls.
“We are still looking for an off-taker; we are still looking for orders. The capacity hasn’t changed that much. We still need orders to utilise our production capacity. We don’t have enough work there.”
Mr Kupa noted that the collapse of local procurement carries severe multi-sectoral repercussions for Zimbabwe’s broader economic value chain.
A single AVM bus is built with 65 percent local content, relying on a deeply integrated industrial network.
Only a 35 percent portion — comprising the engine, gearbox, and twin axles — is imported, he said.
The manufacturing process feeds directly into 91 other independent domestic companies that supply steel, glass, paint, seating, and electrical wiring.
Mr Kupa noted that by importing fully built units, Zimbabwe is effectively exporting critical jobs.
“We think commuter buses should be locally manufactured or assembled,” Mr Kupa emphasised.
“Because apart from AVM, we’ve got 91 companies that feed into bus manufacturing. You can imagine the amount of job losses that we are creating as a country. The number of jobs that we are losing or exporting.”
He noted that the decline directly impacts the training and employment of essential technical artisans.
AVM Africa, which was founded on Harare Street in 1961 before relocating to its current 13-acre Msasa site in the late 1960s, remains the continent’s largest operational bus plant. The company specialises in manufacturing heavy-duty vehicles specifically engineered for rugged local terrain and short-distance urban routes.
While the company is finalising a joint-venture partnership with Belarusian truck and bus giant Minsk Automobile Plant (MAZ) and maintains procurement lines with Chinese suppliers and DAF, its survival rests entirely on a domestic policy shift.
“Government is the biggest buyer of any vehicle, including buses. We expect the Government to give us that support,” Mr Kupa pointed out, acknowledging a recent modest starter order of 10 buses from the state.
“As far as I am concerned, there is no need to buy commuter buses outside the country. Those buses must be local buses.”
While admitting that cross-border long-haul coaches could be imported, he insisted that all urban and peri-urban commuter fleets should be supplied domestically.
AVM recently designed and launched a new 120-passenger city bus, which completed a three-month trial run with the Public Service Commission.
Another newly redesigned commuter bus model is also nearing completion at their plant.
“We are not looking back,” Mr Kupa said. “We think we are a big player in public transport provision . . . We have never stopped.”
The revival of AVM Africa is heavily linked to the full commercial operationalisation of the Dinson Iron and Steel Company (Disco) plant in Manhize, which is expected to localise the supply of primary structural steel, potentially pushing the local content of Zimbabwean-built buses beyond 80 percent.
