Warehouse Receipt Act (Substitution of Schedule) Notice
Zimbabwe's warehouse receipt system now covers a much wider commodity list — cotton, tea, coffee, cassava, sugar cane, fruit and vegetables, and live cattle, goats, pigs, sheep and poultry can all back a warehouse receipt.
The Minister of Lands, Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Rural Development has substituted the schedule of agricultural commodities in the Warehouse Receipt Act [Chapter 18:25], acting under section 29 of that Act. The replacement is printed as the Second Schedule (sections 2 and 31) and lists the commodities that can be deposited in a licensed warehouse and financed against a warehouse receipt.
Grains and oil seeds now include barley, coffee, groundnuts, macadamia nuts, maize, mhunga, oats, pecan nuts, rapoko, rice, soya beans, sorghum, sugar beans, sunflower seed, tea, wheat, cow peas, jugo beans (roundnuts) and cotton and its by-products.
A horticulture category has been added covering apples, avocados, bambara beans, bananas, cabbages and other brassicas, cassava, chillies and other peppers, cucumbers and gherkins, garlic, lemons and limes, mangoes, mangosteens and guavas, grapes, melons, mushrooms and truffles, onions, oranges, peaches and nectarines, potatoes, sugar cane, sweet potatoes, tomatoes and coffee.
Livestock and by-products are covered for the first time in this list: cattle, chicken, duck, goat, pig, sheep and turkey.
Two small oddities in the published text: the operative words say the Minister substitutes 'the Schedule' but the replacement is headed 'Second Schedule', and coffee appears twice, once under grains and oil seeds and again under horticulture. No commencement date is stated; the notice was gazetted on 18 October 2024.
What changed
- The Act's schedule of agricultural commodities is wholly substituted
- Grains and oil seeds list extended to include cotton and its by-products, tea, coffee, cow peas and jugo beans
- A horticulture category added, covering 22 fruit, vegetable and root crops including cassava and sugar cane
- Livestock and by-products added: cattle, chicken, duck, goat, pig, sheep and turkey
Who this affects
- Licensed warehouse operators and commodity depositors
- Banks and microfinance institutions lending against warehouse receipts
- Horticultural and livestock producers newly able to use the system
- Cotton and tea growers
- The Warehouse Receipt System regulator and commodity exchange participants
Plain-language summary — not legal advice. Always read the full instrument.