The act of living in Zimbabwe is somewhat of a risk at the moment, so you might imagine that there might be very little appetite for visiting Zimbabwe’s casinos. Actually, it appears to be operating the other way around, with the atrocious economic conditions creating a higher desire to gamble, to attempt to locate a quick win, a way out of the situation.

For nearly all of the people surviving on the meager local wages, there are two established forms of wagering, the state lotto and Zimbet. Just as with practically everywhere else on the planet, there is a state lottery where the odds of profiting are unbelievably small, but then the prizes are also extremely large. It’s been said by economists who study the idea that many don’t purchase a card with the rational assumption of winning. Zimbet is based on either the local or the English soccer divisions and involves predicting the results of future games.

Zimbabwe’s gambling halls, on the other shoe, cater to the considerably rich of the nation and tourists. Up until a short while ago, there was a very substantial tourist industry, centered on nature trips and trips to Victoria Falls. The market anxiety and connected bloodshed have carved into this trade.

Among Zimbabwe’s gambling dens, there are 2 in the capital, Harare, the Carribea Bay Resort and Casino, which has 5 gaming tables and slot machines, and the Plumtree gambling den, which has just the slot machines. The Zambesi Valley Hotel and Entertainment Center in Kariba also has only slot machines. Mutare has the Monclair Hotel and Casino and the Leopard Rock Hotel and Casino, the pair of which contain table games, one armed bandits and video machines, and Victoria Falls houses the Elephant Hills Hotel and Casino and the Makasa Sun Hotel and Casino, each of which offer slot machines and tables.

In addition to Zimbabwe’s gambling halls and the aforestated talked about lottery and Zimbet (which is considerably like a pools system), there are a total of two horse racing tracks in the country: the Matabeleland Turf Club in Bulawayo (the 2nd city) and the Borrowdale Park in Harare.

Given that the economy has contracted by more than forty percent in recent years and with the associated deprivation and violence that has come to pass, it is not understood how well the tourist industry which funds Zimbabwe’s gambling dens will do in the near future. How many of them will carry on until things improve is simply not known.