Omuthiya
The Omuthiya Town Council has undertaken a new initiative in its fight to attain economic development across the board by investing N$300 000 in the training of existing and upcoming small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
“SMEs have been identified as one of the crucial sectors that need to be strengthened as they are the pillars of economic development in the town, now and in the future. Therefore, through such training they will be able to acquire knowledge to exceed in areas where they are lacking,” said David Israel, the council’s local economic development planner, at the launch of the training workshop yesterday.
The programme is broken down into three phases with at least 120 existing and aspiring entrepreneurs to benefit from the three-day training session.
The trainees are to be mentored on how to register their businesses and put their ideas in action; accounting and finance, and procedures involved in the tendering process.
Israel noted that the tendering process is a critical point which the trainees must understand because the issue is complex and only a few understand the process.
The council has outsourced the training to the country’s renowned Performance Development Centre that strives to improve a business’s performance as well as provide training, courses, seminars and consultancy on a wide range of aspects such as leadership and management, accounting and finance, human resources, planning strategy and development studies.
“I further urge you to listen attentively as this will be of significance to the survival of your business and in your future endeavours to shape the development of our town, as well as create employment,” said Israel.
In response the participants, of whom the majority are women in their late 20s and early 30s, applauded the initiative with some indicating that they were concerned about how to account for finances and how to get access to finance.
Furthermore, they indicated that the tender process was another aspect of concern as they did not have knowledge on how to acquire good standing certificates for their companies to venture into tenders.
A couple of them said they had ideas but did not know how to put them into motion, although they have their businesses registered, but just did not have the know-how to kick-start their business ideas, which have been dormant for years.