Diaspora Matters

Business can be divided into 2 areas, the art of managing money and the art of making money. the art of managing money is a simple one because you learn about it right from high school. Subjects such as Accounting, Commerce, Economics and Business Management help to prepare students in managing finances or managing money. Commercial subjects at under and post graduate levels also significantly help in producing or preparing students for life in managing well business (finances). So what is missing from most people who have done finance subjects? It is the art of making money!

The art of making money is rarely covered and one has to ‘learn by doing’ or learn by observing others. The art of making money or entrepreneurship is a practical subject which was  introduced a few years ago at most tertiary institutions as a standalone degree program from undergraduate to post graduate level. Because it is a recent subject, there are few books written about the subject by  local writers.

Our organisation has therefore compiled a book on entrepreneurship focusing on two key areas:

1. Available opportunities for Zimbabweans and covers more than 50 opportunities.
2. Analysis Skills to empower Zimbabweans to identify opportunities and take advantage of them.

We have avoided the art of managing money because this is comprehensively covered by the current curricular. It is the art of applying for tenders that the current education standards do not cover, preparing your business plan, why you should register your business, how to effectively use digital marketing with practical real examples of success, how to identify opportunities and see the forest from the trees, how to take advantage of opportunities on ‘Virtual Zimbabwe’ by using eCommerce etc

Simply listing investment opportunities by saying there are opportunities in Agriculture, Mining or Tourism is not enough, we wanted the skills so that a reader can apply the skills in other areas. The art of following the money empowers one with skills to identify where money coming into the country comes from, how it is spend and how to take advantage of opportunities coming with money flow. This is not something you will find in your usual finance or business books. We have also studied hard working entrepreneurial communities  such as Indians and the Jews in order to document traits that make them successful entrepreneurs. We also covered our own Dr Strive Masiyiwa, how he is using certain skills to expand his business empire in certain areas.

We have also included an analysis of certain areas, those expanding and providing opportunities for the future. It is therefore crucial for anyone interested in learning new skills on entrepreneurship. We compiled it with youths, women, locals, diasporans and foreign nationals interested in practical skills and opportunities in Zimbabwe.

We avoided naming it opportunities in Zimbabwe because we should be focusing beyond the borders and this is why we included Malawi, Zambia, Angola, Canada, Dubai, DRC,South Africa and Mozambique. Little is written about Mozambique opportunities and yet our organisation has conducted 3 business tours and clinching a purified water deal in the process! Why Mozambicans in Tete import vegetables from South Africa whilst our farmers in Mutoko do not benefit defied logic, why no Zimbabwean entrepreneur never thought of setting up a business in Musina inorder to ‘follow the money’ also defied logic. These are some of the challenging questions that we ask in the book and help inspire readers to think in other terms and take advantage of opportunities.

We list opportunities, we ask questions, we cover our experiences such as trainings and tours, we also cover inspirational stories from the community and above all-we cover necessary skills that we should have learnt and mastered during high school!

Edited by Fungai Mauchi Furusa, an Entrepreneurship Lecturer at  Bindura University of Science, we would like to thank everyone who has supported the compilation of the book. It was not easy to compile a book in a format never done before but we are happy that finally it is out and we hope it will reshape how we view and appreciate entrepreneurship across the region.

The book will be uploaded on the site for ease of purchase. Before uploading, you can get a copy for $25 for soft copies and $35 for hard copies and our contact numbers are +2634339454+263774081808 or +263773055063. You can access hard copies from No 34 Quendon Road, Monavale, Harare Zimbabwe.

Summary of Chapters

Finally the book you have been waiting for will be out tomorrow and available for sale during the weekend! It is a collection of some of our best business discussion and stories plus a lot of new material to inspire you to start a business. It covers some of our researches, business tours, trainings and observations. We have uploaded a snap shot of the book for your view. Costing $25, the book has been discounted so that it can be affordable to most people.

Targets groups include the diaspora, youth in business, sisters in business and locals. The book is also useful to someof our members across the region.

We thank you for your patience, finally the book is here after promising you in December 2017.

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Liquor shops are popular in the developed world. In Africa, South Africa comes top with some of the best liquor shops on the continent. In Zimbabwe they have been accepted too and every liquor shop in town is always busy with customers especially towards the end of the working week and weekends.

Have you ever paused and analysed why they are popular? Well there is a lot of science behind it…it is the experience of getting into a shop and choosing the drink one wants, walking around and comparing new brands and making a decision on quantities. This experience is not found with purchase of ‘off the counter’ drinks. The experience is amazing especially the ‘freedom’ to buy what you want. You can test the temperature too and you can even choose to return a drink before purchase if you see other shoppers buying or inquiring about a new brand that is in town. Here is the added good news-drinkers buy more beer from liquor shops than any other place such as pubs, supermarkets or bottle stores.

The designer of the Liquor Shop concept had thoroughly studied consumer behaviour in a concept called Design Thinking which was borrowed from the engineering field.

Hararians and Liquor Shops

We have had them for a while and they have been doing well. The one at Montagu competes with the one at Newlands. Another popular one is at Pendennis and at Zindoga the Munava one is also popular. Two years ago another one opened its doors to members of the public at Longchen.

Where else can you open them?

We carried out studies in Durban, Johannesburg, East London, Maseru , Musina and found out interesting trends. Do not miss out our book on investment opportunities which come out this Wednesday. We have developed the book with everyone in mind. There is however special focus on Diasporans because there are a lot of trends happening on the ground which you will never read about in newspapers or online. It includes an interesting chapter on digital marketing, opportunities in Agriculture, Services Sector, Star Investments, Mining, Guides on how to do business in China, South Africa and Malawi. Interviews of diasporans in Angola, Canada, Dubai, Mozambique, India and DRC. Priced at $25, the book is an interesting journey meant to equip you with knowledge and skills of taking advantage of business opportunities offered by the coming in of a new dispensation.

Do come back to this site on Wednesday evening  and grab a copy of investment opportunities, how to invest, inspiring stories of entrepreneurs and more.

Fraudsters are back in town! This time they are targeting the mobile money transfer system leaving a lot of small business owners to count heavy losses. How is this happening? We detail below in simple terms;

Normal mobile money transactions process involve one being given a merchant code and entering the code on one’s own phone and then showing the business owner a message that confirms money transfer.

The owner of the business checks with own phone to verify and confirm receipt before handing over goods to complete a sale.

How the system is being rigged

Fraudsters have developed an app that generates a fake mobile money transfer message which they keep in their phones. They produce and show the message to unsuspecting business owners purporting to have transferred money to purchase goods.

Business owners who are not alert may handover goods and complete a sale without checking whether they have received a confirmation message. Failure to check the message is resulting in a large number of business owners falling prey to fraudsters. Those targeted are small tuck-shop owners and small shops. Yesterday we heard a story of someone who lost goods valued at $500 and various stories of others falling for the same trick. For a small business, this kind of loss can throw the whole business under a bus!

Be vigilant

Confirm receipt of money transfer from customers by checking your phone. Do not be in a rush and sell goods before you have received money through transfer. In case of network problems, it is better to suspend sales than to lose goods to fraudsters.

Mobile Money Companies

This is not the first time for members of the public to lose funds to fraudsters. You have a moral responsibility to protect the integrity of the money transfer system and one way to do this is through publicity campaigns warning members of the public of unscrupulous elements using the system and putting in place monitoring systems. You should work hand n glove with the police because many businesses are folding due to these fraudsters who in most cases buy goods in bulk. Imagine the damage to peri-urban and rural business owners?

ZBIN will therefore be creating an online petition on our Facebook Page  to mobile companies to take corrective action to protect the integrity of the mobile money system. They should monitor their systems and help sensitize members of the public of risks coming from those abusing their systems. A monthly message to all subscribers warning them of fraudsters on the prowl will not cost them a fortune but will help save thousands of dollars for small business owners.

The Sunday Mail reports that a record $108 million was disbursed to gold miners in January 2018. The amount is for the 2.7 tonnes of gold deliveries to Fidelity Printers, the gold buying arm of the Reserve Bank. This is great news given that almost half of this gold was delivered by small scale miners (1.2 tonnes).

In the article published by the leading weekly, the Zimbabwe Miners Federation spokesman Mr Dosman Mangisi believes that artisanal miners can deliver way above their current capacity if they access credit facilities. He says ‘ I tell you that if small-scale miners get adequate funds-even small packages of US$20.000-they will acquire critical pieces of machinery such as compressors and increase production’

Our country is fortunate to be endowed with a lot of natural resources and untapped minerals constitute a gold pot for entrepreneurs! Of course we have known about diamonds, copper, chrome, platinum, gold, coal and gold, however a new mineral seems to be enjoying the limelight, the mineral called Lithium has great promise for the country as it is used for many purposes such as ceramics, special glasses and of course batteries for computers, laptops and other electrical goods.

Back to gold, you cannot ignore the $108 million with practically half of it finding its way to small scale miners…there is no better way to empower locals than to give them mines! We expect mining to be disturbed by the incessant rains currently pounding most of the mining areas but with the sector bouncing back to full scale operations around April and then it will be advantage GOLD and other minerals.

So who benefits from minerals exploration especially gold? The first is the miners themselves and secondly Reserve Bank. Who else? We have some interesting stories of brothers in the diaspora benefiting too from the mining sector! Do you remember our story on Strive Masiyiwa’s farm? In case you have forgotten-we said ‘You do not necessarily need to own a farm in order to benefit from agricultural opportunities’ You also do not need to own a mine inorder to benefit from the mining sector as shown by Diasporans based in UK.

Find out more about investment opportunities in Zimbabwe buy supporting and buying our book called Investment Opportunities for Zimbabweans in 2018. The book is very comprehensive and features real life stories of entrepreneurs, covers agricultural, service sector, energy, mining, transport and virtual opportunities. It covers half of the stories we have featured on this site plus indepth review and a lot of investment opportunities we have not covered before.

The book is available in E-copy and costs $25. It will be available for purchase on Friday afternoon this week.

So the future is GOLD, we can add platinum, we can add chrome (we feature interesting stories of in our book), we can add diamonds in Angola but we cannot forget lithium and classify everything as Gold!

The traffic between Harare and Blantyre is increasing everyday, 5 years ago there was only bus plying the Harare-Blantyre route but the number of buses has increased to 3. The buses are Kynergy, TripTrans and ZUPCO. They leave Harare at 6:00am daily and arrive in Blantyre between 6:00pm and 7:00pm.

Cost of Transport: Buses cost US$25 or $30 Bond, all in hard cash form. If you choose to fly, there are daily flights for the route. Air Malawi flies everyday from Harare to Blantyre but with a 45 minute stopover in Lusaka.

Important Advice-Yellow Fever Card: Make sure that you carry a yellow fever vaccination card or face problems with Mozambique and Malawi Immigration officials.

Business Opportunities: Small scale

1.Buses travelling to Malawi from Harare are usually full with clothing material

2. Buses travelling from Malawi to Zimbabwe have Kilombero Rice and goods imported from a Chinese warehouse in Limbe

Business Opportunities: Large Scale

A lot of Zimbabwean consultants are doing business in Malawi in areas such as Agriculture, Engineering and Construction.

A number of great opportunities also exist for entrepreneurs and we will cover more of this in our book on Investment Opportunities coming out next week. Equally important are contact details of reliable people you can do business with in Blantyre. Our book is a collection of entrepreneurship stories and features some of our best read articles as well as previously unpublished material.

Its exactly 2 months before we commemorate 2 years since the banning of Zvihuta or Quail birds! Remember the Quail bird craze that took the country by storm in 2015/16 era? The business of keeping the small birds became an instant hit that created many opportunities for poultry farmers. Some abandoned rearing broiler chickens altogether in favour of the then trending zvihuta project. Some started training people to raise the birds, some made money from selling eggs and even leading retail shops such as TM and OK had the zvihuta meat and eggs on their shelves.

What made zvihuta a hit?

• The project had been brought from UK and generally locals embrace all projects that come from there
• The project had been a follow up of the sack potato project which had emanated from UK
• The Quail had ‘Medicinal Cures’ -it was touted as a solution to many non communicable diseases

Some invested heavily in the project borrowing funds inorder to construct poultry runs to house the birds. The biggest beneficiaries were those who sold eggs and training institutes for quail projects. Then one day, the minister responsible for the sector intervened and confirmed that the medicinal benefits were a hoax-this marked the beginning of an end to a high flying project that had taken the country by storm!

What do we learn from the project?

1. Projects that come from UK are generally accepted by locals
2. The project had resemblance to a commodity Ponzi scheme, those who made the big funds were supplying eggs
3. The scramble for the project showed the high interest in entrepreneurship by locals particularly agriculture
4. Banks reviewing business plans failed on the ‘compliance with local laws and regulation‘ aspect. No-one checked whether the project had been cleared by relevant ministries
5. Projects that affect the medical field are sensitive and investors should carefully check with relevant authorities
6. The project’s success and viral spread was fuelled by Social Media

There are many more lessons, feel free to add, however the follow up project to the quail even spread at a faster rate and it is the now defunct MMM. Those who had been making money from zvihuta  shifted their focus to the money ponzi scheme before the spectacular collapse of the scheme which went off the cliff with more than US$6 million of depositors funds.

So on 16 April 2018, we will commemorate the end of the high riding income generating project that once took the country by storm. We will watch on the horizon for similar projects with traits similar to the zvihuta project.

At face value Bitcoin can earn great returns for investors. A legitimate investment business which is fast gaining recognition across the world. There is no going back on crypto currencies! However few know or can explain in simple terms how this currency came about, how people make or lose money. Where to buy it as well as where to use it. Where to report in terms of losses or who to sue.

The lack of the above crucial information is creating a gap for fraudsters who are now creating ponzi schemes where members of the public are invited to invest funds into a pool with promises of high interest returns. The end result is a significant number of people are losing money to con men! In a recent case which has been circulating on social media–close to $40,000 was lost to a conman who is on the run. His modus operandi was as follows:

1. Invite members of the public to join a Bitcoin  Group
2. Entice members with evidence of huge profits
3. A few invest money and get hefty returns
4. More people join and wire funds to him to invest on their behalf
5. After everyone had transferred funds totaling $40,000 he disappears from the scene.

Attempts to track the culprit through use of his mobile money numbers do not bear  fruit as he had covered his tracks well by dubiously registering his number.

Lessons learnt

• Attend Bitcoin awareness programs, learn more before investing.
• Know well the risks and opportunities involved-do not give funds to anyone to invest on your behalf
• Internet business is good but extremely risky, before parting money its important to phone the land line of the person you are sending money to, physically visit their premises if feasible. Distance increases risk and the more the distance between where you are based and where the person you are dealing with stays-the higher the risk.
• Be on guard, treat everyone with suspicion especially on social media.
• If it is too good to be believed then it probably is, use your gut instinct.

Do not lose out on opportunities in Bitcoin but be careful of fraudsters! About 99.9% of groups sprouting up on social media are created by fraudsters.