From Jo’burg to Nairobi: Global EW news
August 7th, 2008 by chris spavinIt’s been several days since I last posted so my apologies for that. Unfortunately the wordpress dashboard doesn’t like to load in SA or Kenya…
The last post I made covered my first day in Abuja. The second day went really well, too, and pretty much mirrored events from the first day – i.e. a morning full of internal discussion and an afternoon of visiting partners and stakeholders. On this afternoon, I met with a director at SMEDAN (the government’s small and medium enterprise development agency) and Muhammad Baba Kashalla, a special advisor to the Vice President. We went to the presidential villa to meet with Muhammad, and he is a passionate champion for youth entrepreneurship within that office.
I then spent a great two days in Jo’burg with the South African Hosts, Endeavor SA and Junior Achievement SA. We were also lucky enough to have two Ernst & Young colleagues at the meeting. We were also really fortunate to be joined by the Global EW host organizations from Botswana and Madagascar. Frederic, from Madagascar, even managed to get details of our meeting into the Madagasy press. Well done to Frederic!
I am now in Nairobi and have just spent a great day with the initial Global EW Host coalition in Kenya, and have also been joined by Enterprise Uganda. Some of the partners in Kenya include SACOMA, Junior Achievement Kenya, SIFE Kenya and Africa Youth Trust. SACOMA has arranged a Global EW press conference tomorrow at which we will formally announce the initiative and call for more partners. The Deputy Minister for Trade is set to join us.
I will close this post with a couple great ‘inspiring stories’, which really illustrate some of the great enterprises that exist in Africa. The first story is relates to the Botswana national football team, and the the second to some giant rats… (?!)
All Kasi is a local clothing brand from Botswana. It was started by two guys in their late twenties – Ludo, the MD, and Barns, an ex-footballer who stopped playing due to injury. The company had a rocky start, failing once, but eventually secured a small grant from government and is now stocked in 23 stores nationwide. Being avid football fans, the company’s two directors were very sad to see that the Botswana national football team (the Zebras) were so broke that they simply could not afford to trade their jerseys after matches with opposing sides, as is the custom after football matches. So, All Kasi came to the rescue and offered the team a groundbreaking sponsorship deal which now gives players a new kit for each match they play, including a spare one in case of damage, along with casual clothes to wear before/after matches. What a brilliant partnership, and a great way for a young company to give back to a national sports team!! Read more about it here (http://www.bfa.co.bw/news_and_events.php#motho).
The second story is one of a social enterprise called ‘HeroRATS’. You won’t believe this. Bart Weetjens, the founder of HeroRATS, got his first experience with rats as his childhood pets. Years later he remembered his pet rats when he became discouraged by the scourge of landmines in African countries and the expensive, time consuming, and foreign technologies available to clear them from the land. With their terrific sense of smell and trainability, rats could provide a cheaper, more efficient and locally available means to detect landmines. These would be HeroRATS. HeroRATS uses enormous African pouched rats (they are real mothers – see below) to safely detect landmines – which never go off, because the rats are so light on their feet! For more on this great story and enterprise, go here (http://www.herorat.org/en/about)
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