By Valerie Chatindo
Zimbabwe has long taken pride in its education system. With one of the highest literacy rates in Africa, the country built a reputation on decades of investment in basic education. Programmes such as BEAM and the School Improvement Grant, alongside support from civil society and development partners, have helped widen access to schooling.
But access to education in Zimbabwe has never been equal.
Rural schools continue to face overcrowded classrooms, shortages of learning materials, under-resourced teachers and weak infrastructure. As education becomes increasingly digital, another divide is emerging: who can access technology and who cannot.
This is the context in which Zimbabwe’s 15% digital services tax has been introduced.
On paper, the policy appears reasonable. Governments around the world are seeking ways to capture revenue from the growing digital economy. But in practice, the tax does not only affect entertainment subscriptions or convenience apps. It also raises the cost of tools that students and teachers increasingly rely on: online learning platforms, research databases, design software, cloud storage and virtual classrooms.
For many urban learners, these tools are already part of daily schooling. In rural communities, they remain difficult to access due to poor connectivity, limited infrastructure and household poverty. Adding additional costs to digital services risks widening an already stark educational divide.
The digital divide is not simply about internet access. It is about opportunity.
Many rural schools still struggle with basic learning materials, reliable electricity and trained teachers. In these environments, digital tools are not luxuries. They offer access to updated curricula, remote teacher training, research resources and national learning networks that would otherwise remain out of reach.
But digital learning comes at a cost. Platforms used for coursework, communication and research are increasingly subscription-based. A 15% tax on these services may appear small in macroeconomic terms, yet for schools operating on extremely limited budgets and families surviving on informal incomes, it becomes another barrier to participation.
What is framed as fiscal policy quietly becomes an educational gatekeeper.
Zimbabwe’s education system already reflects deep rural-urban inequalities. Many learners leave school early not because they lack ambition, but because poverty, distance and limited institutional support make continued education difficult. As schooling becomes more digitised through online assignments, exam registration systems, research portals and virtual classrooms, the cost of digital participation increasingly determines who can keep up.
If digital tools are taxed without parallel investment in access and infrastructure, the outcome is predictable: education becomes further stratified along lines of geography, income and connectivity.
There is also a question of trust. Citizens are often told that new taxes are necessary for national development. Yet many Zimbabweans remain uncertain about how tax revenue is allocated and whether it reaches critical social sectors such as education. For schools that still lack textbooks, classrooms and basic resources, promises that new revenue will “eventually” benefit them ring hollow.
Educational equity cannot be built on policies that assume equal starting points.
If the state chooses to tax the digital economy, it must also invest in digital inclusion. That means subsidised educational platforms, zero-rated learning resources, expanded rural connectivity and training for teachers to use digital tools effectively. Without such safeguards, digital taxation risks reinforcing the very inequalities education is meant to overcome.
The consequences are not only economic but generational. When rural learners are priced out of digital learning spaces, they are excluded from emerging forms of knowledge, skills development and civic participation. In a global economy increasingly shaped by technology, this is not a minor inconvenience. It is a matter of future opportunity.
Education has long been one of Zimbabwe’s most powerful equalising forces. Preserving that legacy requires policies that recognise unequal realities and actively work to correct them.
The question is not whether Zimbabwe can tax the digital economy; it is whether it can do so without taxing the futures of rural learners.