Learning English - Words in the News 18 January, 2008 - Published 14:24 GMT Zimbabwe's $10m banknotes | ||||||||||||
Zimbabwe's central bank is introducing new higher denomination banknotes today in an effort to ease the critical shortage of cash in the country. Zimbabwe's economic decline for the past eight years has caused annual inflation to be in excess of 50,000%. This report from Peter Biles: The introduction of the new banknotes - or "bearer cheques" as they're officially called - is a further attempt to stabilise the Zimbabwean economy. There have been long queues every day at banks as people have struggled to withdraw cash. The government's only response is to print more money, and that's seen as the main reason for the hyper-inflation. There have been no official inflation figures published for the past three or four months. Zimbabwe's Reserve Bank Governor, Gideon Gono, has called on the business community not to increase prices every time new measures are taken to adjust the currency. The new higher denomination banknotes are certain to cause more confusion, and they may only bring short-term relief. In the meantime, many people have become dependent upon imported goods, there are still severe shortages of fuel, and power supplies remain erratic. Peter Biles, BBC News, Johannesburg a further attempt to stabilise struggled to withdraw cash hyper-inflation called on to adjust the currency higher denomination are certain to cause more confusion bring short-term relief imported goods power supplies remain erratic | LATEST STORIES 27 May, 2011 Destruction of smallpox virus delayed 25 May, 2011 Micro-finance 'misused and abused' 20 May, 2011 Lonely planets 18 May, 2011 Germany to invest in more electric cars 16 May, 2011 Argentina builds a tower of books Other Stories | |||||||||||