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Addressing business leaders and political leaders at the half year monetary policy presentation on Wednesday, the 84 year leader said time has come for people to be disciplined and charge affordable prices.

He said: "Do not drive us further than you have done in the past. We will impose emergency measures under a state of emergency. We do not want to place our country under a state of emergency where we will tell you what price to charge and nothing else. In a state of emergency rules can be tough and we have to say take care. We might have to do that, so please take care."

Mugabe added that the monetary policy alone cannot solve the country's economic woes but it has to be coupled by political will.

"As the Governor has pointed out in his statement, it is not monetary policy alone or the politics of the land that we look to for the turnaround of our economy although these form the important and critical pillars to that process," he said.

He said behavioural change is needed on everyone particularly the business community who have been tempted to chase after wealth at any cost regardless of business ethics or discipline.

Mugabe said: "It is incumbent upon us all to rededicate ourselves to ethical norms and behaviour as we strive to shun parallel market activities, illegal dealings, profiteering and everything that disregards consumer rights."

Mugabe has on a number of times fired a broadside on local business owners who he has often accused of siding with western nations to put pressure on the government in order to effect regime change.

He said: "The country is under illegal and barbaric sanctions whose sole objective is "Kubvisa VaMugabe pachigaro" (removing Mugabe from power) regardless of the will and wishes of Zimbabweans."

Last week, the US and the EU imposed more sanctions on Zimbabwean leaders, companies and some journalists.

In his monetary policy statement, Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe governor Gideon Gono acknowledged the reality of sanctions which saw some governments like Germany which terminated the supply of currency paper at the beginning of July.

A Germany company had been supplying Zimbabwe with currency paper for over 50 years.

Gono said: "It is difficult to avoid the inescapable conclusion the inclusion of some journalists in the latest US sanctions is an audacious and yet most unfortunate attack not just on press freedom itself but also on the principle of tolerance that is at the heart of what many, including US government, say is absent in our national politics today."