But Zimbabwe is hurtling toward a plastic future for a simple reason: It is running out of cash, specifically the American dollars it adopted in 2009 before abandoning its own troubled currency. Anxious about their nation’s political and economic troubles, many Zimbabweans have been hoarding dollars or taking them out of the country. Banks have slashed daily withdrawal limits. A.T.M.s now sit empty.

Debit card machines are proliferating in Zimbabwe’s cities — not only in churches but also in supermarkets, betting parlors, nightclubs, parking areas and every other business happy to accept paper cash but unable to dispense it. If there are no card-reading machines around, many shoppers now text payments on their cellphones.

The change has been revolutionary for what was a mostly cash economy until early this year. It has helped ease the cash crisis, which paralyzed business a few months ago. In a fragile economy reeling from a global collapse in commodity prices, a historic drought and lack of investor confidence, the spread of plastic is the one bright spot.

“We had to migrate to electronic platforms as a matter of necessity, rather than as a matter of choice,” said Clive Mphambela, an advocacy and marketing executive at the Bankers Association of Zimbabwe. “Zimbabwe is unique in many, many respects, and this is just one of them.”

The cash crunch remains so severe that the government started a media campaign this week to publicize the imminent introduction of so-called bond notes, paper notes that it says will be backed by the African Export-Import Bank and will be interchangeable with the American dollar. But most Zimbabweans already view the notes with deep distrust, suspecting a government ploy to reintroduce a local currency.