Our question of the week is when is Uber coming to Zimbabwe? Does it mean there is no business potential in Zim? They are already in South Africa and Tanzania, how about Zim?
Diaspora Matters
More ZBIN members are inboxing your admins looking for cars for hire during the festive season. Some of the people in need of cars for hire are returning Diasporans and some are locals looking for cars for hire for wedding functions.
If you have not registered with us we are encouraging you to put your details below:
Contact Name:
Location:
Vehicle Type:
Phone Number:
All the best
Good Morning to ZBIN Family, we hope that you are doing fine. Its exactly 10 days before Christmas how are you doing in terms of festive business preparations? Did you follow the advice we gave you on festive season business preparations?
Have you seen that we cover all business areas? Some of the investment areas covered require millions of dollars in terms of capital for instance investment in Energy that we covered last week, some may require as little as $50 in the case of Rabbit Farming. We cover everything as requested by our members.
We hope to improve in terms of business ideas and tips that we give you. So far we our work is only 2% where we just indicate areas to invest in without providing deep analysis reports, feasibility studies and even test runs of business ideas. We look forward to being organised in 2017 and providing value for money in terms of the depth of business advice provided to members.
So what do we have this Thursday morning? Well it’s a simple idea and targets our ZBIN Baking Group members. You guys have been active with a lot of recipes being shared, a lot of business generated. One are of weakness is that you failed to organise a Field Day as planned, you also failed to host a Festive Season Baking Day for Fathers. Iam confident that we will do better in 2017.
Our idea of the day is that of establishing a home bakery as a starting point before going fully commercial. Instead of only baking cakes why not cover buns, biscuits, samosas, chocolates, bread and have your neighbourhood as your customer base?
You start with neighbours, church members and with time you reach out to schools in the neighbourhood. Your small buns vanopfuura vachinhonga.You can even make it more like a drive inn bakery…a place where folks pass through vachitora fresh bread vachienda kumba….good parking space is key..with time ana amai vanowana nzvimbo yekutandarira vachinwa havo tea nema biscuits or coffee nema small cakes.
Minimum Requirements
1.Bakery equipment for small to medium scale operations
2.Professional display racks-or fridges (check out our main photo)
3.Neat and tidy home (Presentation-presentation-presentation)
4. Good Parking space
5. Friendly environment.
6. Relevant City Council approvals and permits
So consider this as a possible option if you are into baking. We hope to cover more business related topics targeting the one thousand member ZBIN Baking Community.
All the best
So you have secured a residential stand? Congratulations to you for getting a legit residential stand. Last time on ZBIN when we tackled Real Estate Issues we covered ‘how to avoid losing hard earned money by buying dubious residential stands’. If you have not read the post then we urge you to go on the search button and look for this very helpful post.
Anyway the aim of this post is to help first time home builders especially in terms of what to avoid. So you have secured your stand, you have an approved house plan and you are raring to go. Below we will help you in a few critical areas. More areas will be covered in next instalments.
Searching for builders: No doubt a difficult talk and we encourage you to search widely and make sure that you have the right personnel for the job. Do not pick anyone from the street but consult friends or relatives, check adverts on newspapers. Shortlist at least 4 builders and ask them to bring details of who will be working with them (their teams). Once you have details of team composition then do a background check and ask for referrals. We urge you to get at least 4 referrals. The reason you will be doing this is because you do not want inexperienced people to be doing anything on your residential site.
Builders with many contracts: On what to avoid is a situation where the builder has too many jobs such that they subcontract the work to someone else. This is why its important to find who they will be working with. You will need to check this when doing referral work and it may be useful to always check whether they are on the site or not.
Stolen Building Materials: Perhaps your biggest risk, get this fact right-these guys will definitely steal building materials-mostly cement and bricks and it will be hard to know that you have been conned. The end result will most likely be a house that has walls that crack in the long run. So how do you reduce the risk? Its difficult to pinpoint a sure-fire way that reduces risk-sometimes you can opt to have someone who can oversee the project implementation. It can work provided there is no collusion between someone whom you have chosen and the builders. A friend of mine once assigned a relative to provide checks and balances-the relative ended up finding buyers of cement! Our recommendation on the issue is that you should be available on the ground to see certain house construction stages such as the construction of the foundation.
We will cover more Real Estate matters in the coming weeks such as new suburbs in Harare and Bulawayo, housing trends and a comparison of the Real Estate sectors of Zimbabwe and South Africa.
Wishing you a great day.
ZBIN Continues with the agenda of Diaspora Engagement looking at possible areas Governments in Southern Africa can benefit from implementing Diaspora Strategies. Last time we brought you the advantages that can accrue to both parties- Home Countries and the Diaspora.
Today we cover 10 principles of good practice in drafting Diaspora Strategies.
A diaspora strategy should be centralized enough to ensure that a common identity, sense of purpose, collective consciousness, economies of scale, and strategic priorities can be achieved, but loose enough to let a thousand flowers bloom. Coordinated anarchy is not entirely indispensable.
- A diaspora strategy cannot privilege economic ties over social and cultural networks and still be sustainable.
- A diaspora strategy needs to be mutually beneficial for both home countries and diasporic populations.
- Countries that know their Diasporas well will be better placed to engage them.
5. Diaspora strategies should define ‘diaspora’ as broadly as possible to avoid racializing national social, cultural, economic, and political policies – and should include affinity Diasporas policies where appropriate.
- The diaspora needs to be consulted before any diaspora strategy is rolled out; diaspora strategies must be co-authored if they are to work.
- Diaspora strategies need to be transparent and need to be held accountable, but given the specificity and the many intangible benefits of policy interventions, distinctive and unique policy impact analysis tools and evaluative frameworks and metrics need to be developed.
8. There is no ideal institutional framework for coordinating diaspora strategies; each country needs to devise forms of engagement which reflect their own institutional histories, social, cultural, economic, and political needs, and the histories, structures and organization of their diaspora.
- Diaspora strategies need to be brought into the growing international conversation about best practice and should pro-actively affiliate themselves with networks involved in policy dissemination.
- Diaspora strategies need to be underpinned by a philosophically grounded rationale which resonates with the country’s deepest social, economic, cultural, and political needs at any point in time. Shallow slogans might lead to short-term gains but will fail over the long term; a meaningful overarching identity will galvanise and energize.
Credit: Prof. Mark Boyle, Prof. Rob Kitchin, and Dr. Delphine Ancien, NUI Maynooth, Irelan
So Iam beginning to see GP plates on Harare’s roads? This is a welcome development, our brothers and sisters from the Diaspora are back. They are slowly trooping back home and we wish you well during the festive season.
So to those still deciding to come and you are not sure of what to buy and bring home, here is a very good tip. How about buying machinery or equipment that can help you or relatives back home in money making ventures? Below we look at some of the items you can purchase;
1. Gym Equipment: Gym equipment is unbelievably cheap in South Africa, not sure about Botswana and Zambia. You can consider establishing a backyard gym for your relatives back home-visit Game Stores for comparing prices. Do not buy all the equipment at one go, instead do the purchase on a piecemeal basis-some this holiday and the next during Easter or next holidays.
2. Events Management Equipment: Consider folding tables, cooking utensils, plastic chairs for hiring to churches, political parties, funerals etc
3. PA Systems for hire: A good way to make extra monies through hiring out to schools, churches and other functions.
4. Printing Machinery: So we are entering an elections period? During this period there is going to be a lot of printing services-tshirts,posters etc. Consider setting up backyard photocopiers-buy used photocopiers-zvinonobatsira muzukuru asina basa.
5. Mining Equipment for hire: This may need huge capital outlays, but research and find out from Auctions in South Africa, you may be fortunate to buy machinery at rock bottom prices.
6. Jumping Castles: Another source of passive income, research on the jumping castles and bring some home.
So safe travel to those coming to Zimbabwe, and to those already in Zimbabwe, enjoy your stay!
Happy Holidays
The biggest event on the forum was the trip to Tete by the ZBIN Portuguese Group and we thank the Almighty that all went well. The group lead by Clara Mapfumo was in the Mozambican City for a period of 2 days and I hear they did well and will follow up in the coming two weeks.
After the Tete visit we shift our focus to Beira. We are still at planning stage and deciding whether to travel to Beira or Chimoio from the 28th to the 29th of December. More details will be shared with the forum members during the next two weeks.
Interviews
So we continue to unlock business information from Zimbos based in the Diaspora and to date we have given you interviews from India, DRC, Namibia, Canada, Dubai and Cape Town. Today we covered another interview with a sister based in Pemba a city which few Zimbos know about. I would like to thank Mrs Kapitawo for agreeing to be interviewed and sharing a lot of photos from a city which is hard to pinpoint where it is on the map.
I have secured another interview with a ZBIN sister based in Germany, a successful business person and an Accountant working in Germany who has interesting stuff for the ZBIN community. Expect this interview on Wednesday-another interview of a sister based in Kenya should be coming during the end of the week.
Why Interviews? The reason is simple, to help you get official information about other areas where vana vevhu stay and show that you too can do it. The interview with Mrs Kapitawo shows that she has opened a new company in Mozambique and as a member of ZBIN Baking she is going to get a lot of help from others who are in the business and she can also help inspire others. This is the founding principle of ZBIN, unlocking business opportunities through networking and business information exchanges.
Adverts Section
There are few takers for the free platform we have on the website where we are inviting members to place their adverts for goods or services for sale. This platform is much better than Facebook adverts where you have to compete with thousands of other advertisers. So use this platform for your own benefit.
Videos on the Platform
So I discovered a new way of putting Youtube videos on the forum this week and this has been helpful in telling the full story of any issue posted on our website. Kindly refer to Clara Mapfumo’s video on opportunities in Mozambique. We shot the video at our meeting held at Paramount a month ago. We invite members to improve in terms of marketing- in addition to photos, please shoot short videos and post on Youtube. If you have challenges in uploading on Youtube then send them to me during weekends.
Videos are going to help you explain fully your business story, they are going to help you identify new markets and potential partners. So make short videos and don’t worry about quality, we will improve with time. A two to four minute is good enough for a start. Iam therefore expecting my inbox to be flooded with videos every Saturday or Sunday and promise to upload them all. If you like to see the impact of videos then compare and contrast a newspaper and a television! So from mining,baking,poultry,online forex trading – Iam looking forward to your videos.
Research
As promised, we will be making follow ups on Vending Machines and Crowd Funding and will share information with you during the week.
Online Newsletter
Have you registered on our website so that you can receive our newsletter? Don’t be left out kindly register on our website for weekly summaries of posts and new developments in terms of investment.
The 2017 National Budget
We hope to look at the National Budget that was presented this week and will look at what this means for the ordinary ZBIN member-those in business and those considering investment. We will look at possible scenarios in terms of business, if you like financial modelling then here is your chance to participate as we develop more models for use by the group. This will only be distributed via our newsletter.
Group Logo
Vote of Thanks to the ZBIN member, a hardworking and innovative youngster who developed our forum logo for free. We will feature him on the website during the week. May God bless you abundantly for the efforts.
Holidays and Parenting
Are you a parent? Do you have kids? If your answer to the two questions is yes, then here is something interesting we are going to be doing-we will be covering topics to help young minds to appreciate business. A couple of researches will be coming your way and the first one is creating of a vending machine, please refer them to the vending machine post and show them how to make one. It will help them in sharpening their research,teamwork,innovation and business skills. All you need to do is to download the video, buy the materials and then give them a task. We will come up with a comprehensive list of projects for them next week.
So till next week, WaMdala signs off
Growth projected at 1.7% from 0.6% estimated in 2016
Agriculture and Mining to drive overall growth with sector growth of 12% and 0.9% respectively
Inflation projected at 1.1%, from a negative of 1.5% in 2016
Total expenditures projected at $4.1 billion
Financing Gap of $400m
Government wage bill takes $3.0 billion in 2017
Capital Expenditure amounts to $520 million or 3.6% of GDP
Trade Deficit of $1.5 billion compared to $1.985 in 2016
Debt Stock of $11,2 billion as at 31 October 2016, which is 79% of GDP
In this video, the Zimbabwe Energy Regulatory Authority showcases investment opportunities in the energy sector.
When it comes to business information, ZBIN leads the pack and credit goes to members who freely contribute business information. In other countries this information is expensive as one has to part with a lot of monies to obtain basic business information.
As ZBIN we like to help members with free information so that this can assist you in decision making. We provide the information on a publicly available platform such that information provided can be corrected should it turn out to be false.
So this Sunday we are in Mozambique and we find a sister, a member of the forum-Mrs Faith Kapita! She has agreed to give us an insight into Pemba, the tourist city near the border with Tanzania.
Below is my interview with her
Tell us about yourself
Iam currently a house wife but do bake cakes as my main business
How is the weather in Pemba?
Temperatures are very high and can get up to 30 degrees Celsius by 7:00am and this hot weather sometimes adversely affect my baking business because it sometimes force me to use fresh cream and butter instead of icing.
Do you have a Company?
I successfully registered my company yesterday and also opened a bank account at the same time.
Is there a Zim Community or you are the only Zimbo there?
Yes there is a Zim community here and its quite large. Some people are employed formally and some re into buying and selling(vanouya kuzotengesa masheets)
What is the best time to visit Pemba?
There is no best time as our weather conditions rarely fluctuates-its usually hot through out the year(kutsva basi all year).
Education for kids, do you have schools for expats?
We only have one international school and my kid is going there for grade one next year. The fees are 40,500 per quarter and each year has 4 quarters
Cost of Living in Pemba
The cost of living is expensive since this is a tourist town
Major Shops/Supermarkets in Pemba
We currently have 3 grocery shops and that is VIP , PEP and Rechero. We have challenges of boutiques such that if you like top quality clothes then you must go to Dare Salam or Maputo.
Nearest City to Pemba
The nearest city to us is Nampula which is 550 kilometres away.
Do you have banks?
Yes we have Moza Banco, Standard, UNICO,Barclays and BC1, they all have visa cards.
Other Professionals in Pemba?
We have plenty of Somalians who operate spaza shops selling electricals, plastics and Chinaware. Senegalese also own spaza shops. Pakistanis own grocery wholesales and locals in the informal sector do sell ‘fat cooks’.
In this photo: A spaza shop owned by a Senegalese
Do you grow Fruit and Veges?
No our greens come from Nampula which is 550kms away as mentioned earlier
Electricity and Water Availability
Electricity is forever available, water is a challenge for out of town. We buy drinking watr from Augua Quivk or Agua Petra