Boost Sife Zimbabwe Fact Sheet

FACT SHEET

MARCH ‘09

BOOST/SIFE ZIMBABWE: BUILDING OPPORTUNIT IES ON STUDENT TALENT University students in Zimbabwe students shocked the business and academic world when they scooped the coveted SIFE World Cup in business and entrepreneurship in 2005. October 7 2005 will certainly go down in the history of Africa as a date when under-funded, ill equipped, African universities riddled with irrelevant courses, whipped their counterparts from the developed World. Zimbabwe beat other 41 countries to emerge international champions and send a strong message that the modern day African youth are no longer waiting for tomorrow; they are taking leadership today! This is their story.... Self empowerment is the first step to being the agent of change. Young people should not be controlled by the environment, they should create their own environment so as to influence it.’ It is imperative that in pursuing these initiatives, students seek to create synergistic relationships with the corporate sector to create sustainable partnerships that foster growth at the bottom of the pyramid.

grams, budgeting, create marketing plans, prepare annual reports, and make presentations. Having learned these skills, they graduate from college understanding the importance of building relationships, knowing how to network, and having the ability to read a P&L statement.

Situational Information/Background

SIFE links the business community to the academia; facilitates community projects geared towards nurturing business minded students while promoting entrepreneurship world wide. Once in a year, country directors organize a national competition among the universities to determine the institution with the highest community outreach impact.

SIFE students put classroom knowledge to work in the real world. Working with faculty advisors, SIFE team members design and implement projects that teach them to conduct feasibility studies, write business plans, develop training pro-

The SIFE program in Zimbabwe started at the University of Zimbabwe in 2004 and is now coordinated by the BOOST (Building Opportunities on Student talent) Fellowship. The Fellowship envisions a world of purposeful people, who

This fact sheet looks at initiatives students from the BOOST/SIFE Zimbabwe program are carrying out to stimulate the BOP while at the same time harnessing corporate involvement.

serve Africa's needs for life sustainability, cultivating possibility oriented living by fostering the principles of entrepreneur intelligence and servant leadership. To date the BOOST/SIFE program has a presence in all the universities in the country as well as a few vocational colleges. Among the fellowship’s values include community service and creativity through which BOOST/ SIFE students generate novel and useful ideas and solutions from

Inside this issue: Background

1

Projects and Their Impact

2

Recognition

4

Conclusions

4

everyday problems and challenges. It involves the translation of unique gifts, talents and vision into an external reality that is new and useful.

In addition, sustainability was ensured through a long term commitment by Agritex and export sales guarantee by Anchor Holdings, create a stable market for the community.

Projects and Their Impact Zimbabwe projects focused mainly on farmers and HIV-AIDS pandemic. The University of Zimbabwe facilitated farmers to increase their productivity through low cost farm inputs, and branding of products. They also taught HIV-AIDS victims how to be economically productive while at the same time promoting effective preventive measures for those not infected. In 2008, the BOOST/SIFE University of Zimbabwe team embarked on the “Think Green Project”, in partnership with Anchor Holdings (yeast producing company) in designing a 2 year working program aimed at pushing for an environmentally friendly agenda for agricultural production in Africa through Organic farming practices. The group also roped in the Institute of Mining Research at the University of Zimbabwe, agro geology specialists and researchers at the University of Guelph in Canada, and the Department of Agriculture and Research Extension in Rusape. A pre-project feasibility evaluation determined that farmers in the Rusape community, faced stiff competition due to product homogeneity hence under priced their produce and also faced procurement challenges. ThinkGreenProject Anchor Holdings supplied 2600 kg of organic vegetables per month per scheme

“PPB fostered employment creation as farmers increased their crop yields thereby generating forward and backward linkages that improved rural communities by addressing macro economic challenges brought about by unemployment” SIFE UZ President 2008 Africa University (AU) has been working on a project called Nzeve (shona for ear) which focuses on an institution that caters for individuals with speech and hearing impairments, since 2002. The AU-BOOST/SIFE team carried out entrepreneurship training for the group, numbering 572, engaged in sewing and carpentry projects. The team created a website (www.africau.edu/sife/) to showcase products made by the Nzeve group then leveraged its networks to create a market for products with auditing firm Ernst and Young. The Chiedza Projects sought to rehabilitate street youths through two different initiatives. The first one is a group of 40 rehabilitated street children, under Simukai Street youth programme ranging from 7 to 19 years of age. AU taught the SIFE principles to the participants and the practical activities undertaken with the group included, scrunchy making, bead making, card making and gardening.

IMR supplies farmers with 500kgs of phosphate pellet required for ppb atUSD$0.50/kg, reducing input costs by 40%.

These were the activities that matched the skills and interests of the children and so were used to facilitate easier understanding of free market economies and ethics.

Through a phased approach, the students carried out a 12 week training program to address the technical and business aspects of organic farming with Agritex officials, and partnered the community with Anchor Holdings for the production of Phosphate Pelletized Blend (ppb) fertilizer.

The next stage of the project involved engaging a professional gift and present designer to take the participants through the processes of making quality products that will satisfy the needs of their consumers.

With the help of the designer, the children were able to identify consumer needs for their products and model their offerings to satisfy this need. The next phase of the project will be assisting the participants to create a brand for their products.

Africa University also targeted the rural women in Nyamajura communal lands, in the Eastern Highlands for its Tichakunda Project. This community is agro centric and as is typical of rural Zimbabwe, women are the most marginalized group. Through the facilitation of the students, the women came up with an innovative way of making soap and tye & dying as a means of supplementing their income. The name ‘Tichakunda’ means we will overcome the poverty that persist using the naturally available resources. They now make the soap from the jatropha plant, which prior to these projects was used as fencing around households and small gardens. The tie and dye material comes from the locally available plants and animals. Womens University in Africa‟s Shungu is a soya beans project located at Women’s University in Africa’s farm in Marondera, east of Harare, run by twenty seven (27) wives of the farm workers. The students empowered the women with entrepreneurial skills and created partnerships with SEEDCO, a Zimbabwe Stock Exchange listed company for the provision of seeds and insecticides. “We may not have won the national competitions but the smile we left on those communities we helped see a better day lingers in my mind and makes me feel corded such an opportunity to be in the BOOST /SIFE programme.” Marko Midzi, Alumni

Ekhaya is an outreach project by the Chinhoyi University BOOST/SIFE team that gave poor and underprivileged communities training in entrepreneurship. The program was initiated through collaboration with TRCC and PACT Zimbabwe and is focused on the Hwedza and Chirumanzu districts.

entrepreneurial training with a focus on contract negotiations. The farmers formed a cooperative in the name of Ivhu Upenyu (soil is life) Association to thereafter, the UZ team linked up the farmers with partners of the BOOST/SIFE UZ team such as Gustai Convenience Stores, Spar, Interfresh and the Zimsun Leisure Groups.

livelihoods and their desire to learn and know even if it’s from a younger generation. It was also insightful how companies were willing to work with poor communities through contract farming, for example, in the process building the community’s capacity to spend on the firm’s produce.” Josephine Gumbo, BOOST/SIFE UZ Alumni 2004

Since 2004, the BOOST/SIFE UZ team has been involved with the Agrilink Project targeted at the Domboshava community, a few kilometers outside the capital city of Harare community. The project objective is to assist horticulture producing peasant farmers in Domboshava shift from subsistence to commercially oriented farming and profitably exploit formal markets.

It facilitated the negotiation of contracts with these partners enabling the direct distribution of farm produce to the retailers and hoteliers, effectively cutting out the middleman.

The project was initiated after realizing the difficult conditions the farmers went through to sell their produce (tomatoes and soya beans) to middlemen at the Mbare Bus Terminus open market.

For the farmers, they were able to fetch a higher price than that prevailing on the open market at Mbare; were assured of a guaranteed market provided they maintained a certain minimum quality threshold and didn’t need to sleep at the terminus waiting for the market to open anymore.

Midlands State University‟s MASO project focused on people living with HIV/AIDS and in partnership with the Midlands Aids Services Organization to facilitate entrepreneurship training and establishment of small scale business enterprises. As a result, the community is now running a small businesses selling juice extracted from sweet potatoes and cassava, candle making and dress making. A further spinoff was that fourteen (14) students on the BOOST/SIFE program were training to be Secondary care givers to people living with HIV/AIDS.

The intermediaries (middlemen) in turn have contracts to sell to the major retailers i.e. Interfresh, Spar, OK, Bon Marche and TM supermarkets, raking up to 300% mark ups. Prices decline significantly, by up to 75% as midmorning approaches, as most intermediaries would have completed their bidding by 6 am, and for

those farmers still with produce, there is need to clear off whatever remains before they return to their villages. As a result, farmers have to be at the market as early as 3 am and most sleep at the open market in order to fetch the higher prices prevailing. Having identified the challenge facing the farmers, the UZ team embarked on

For the retailers and hotelier, the key benefit was a reduced price from the one offered by the middleman as well as a constant supply of fresh produce from the farmers.

Furthermore, the University of Zimbabwe team worked with the cooperative to improve their organizational structure and improve leadership skills. Entrepreneurship training, financial management, marketing and sales were all covered in workshops. In addition, soy milk byproducts from residue were developed to increase cash flow. Soy milk production has increased 300% and the cooperative’s profits have been boosted from $4,000 to $18,000 a month. The entire village has benefited from this, with the village bank being revamped and AIDS patients/orphans receiving supplementary feeding. “At a personal level it was enriching and fulfilling to see the willingness of poor communities to improve their

University of Zimbabwe’s team „Heal The Nation‟ project’s main objective was to improve the livelihood of unemployed people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS through entrepreneurship. The team partnered with Zimbabwe Women’s Bureau and the Catholic Relief Services (which provided funding). A group of 180 participants from three (3) different low income residential areas were selected. Thereafter, two idea generation sessions were conducted where participants decided in favor of Oyster Mushroom production. Three BOOST/SIFE University of Zimbabwe students together with Zimbabwe Women’s Bureau staff subsequently trained participants how to grow this mushroom variety. Participants were also taught basic bookkeeping, marketing skills, negotiation skills and business ethics over a period of 6 weeks.

Your Contacts at the BOP Learning Lab:

University of Stellenbosch Business School Prof. W. Thomas t:+27 21 82 770 9694 E:[email protected] Maclintosh Kuhlengisa (Research Assistant) t:+27 73 089 0780 E: [email protected] Norma Sayman (Secretary) E:[email protected] www.usb.sun.ac.za

Recognition The University of Zimbabwe students shocked the business and academic world when it scooped the coveted SIFE World Cup in business and entrepreneurship in Canada in October 2005. Zimbabwe beat other 41 countries to emerge international champions and send a strong message that the modern day African youth are no longer waiting for tomorrow; they are taking leadership today!

To the African universities, the objective ought not to be to churn out as many people with degrees, but to release to the world, graduates who are capable of enriching themselves and developing the communities around them To the business community in Africa, join the academia and the communities to make a difference in Africa. One person, one village, one community at a time, and Africa will cease being a continent sized beggar.

Lena Zamchiya Chief Executive Officer The BOOST Fellowship 1 Walterhill Avenue Eastlea Harare, Zimbabwe Tel: +263 4-794759 Fax: +263 4-794987/760 [email protected]

Conclusion

What lesson does Zimbabwe offer to the students of Africa? Each individual African must focus on potential opportunities. The University students in Zimbabwe are illustrating the power of not investing in negativism, by seeing the possibilities rather than the problems of life – and exploiting the opportunities that then arise for the betterment of the society at large. Jack Shewmaker, (Past SIFE International Chairman and Former President of Wal-mart Stores) remarked in 2004 that “…entrepreneurs have no time for negativism, there is no such thing as a problem; everything is just an opportunity.”

Letitia de Wet Country Director, SIFE South Africa PostNet Suite 305 - Private Bag X30500 HOUGHTON, 2041, South Africa Tel: +27 (0)82 883 1758 Fax: +27 (0)16-341-4457 [email protected]