ZBIN was in Chitungwiza today for a business presentation and what is the feedback? The feedback is that the presentation was successful, the response from Revival Ministries Church being awesome. Truth is we had never heard about the name of this pentecostal church! We did not even know where is it located but when the invitation to come and present came-we welcomed it with open hands, we do not turn down opportunities to talk about business to church members. We do this for free and this is something we love to do-to share business information and help inspire Zimbabweans to identify opportunities and take advantage of them.
The Church and Lack of Business Information
We asked the more than 100 congregants how many new of the POTRAZ Funding Opportunity? The answer was none, We asked how many were aware of the Homelink Credit Facility? Only 2 members had heard about it and mostly through the STARFM Radio program. We asked how many were knowledgeable of the Ministry of SME: India-Africa Incubation Centre, Harare Opportunities for training? The response was none!
This was very worrisome because this information is available free of charge, this information is available on Facebook, newspapers and also on this site. What made the situation worse is that the deadlines for the application of these funds are drawing close and yet hundreds of people have no knowledge of them.
The Good News
The good news is that we gave church members information of where they can get funding and the need for speed in applying. Our presentation was mostly concentrated on changing the mindset inorder to identify opportunities, the need to be always looking for opportunities, the importance of business plans, the digital economy and opportunities, case studies of success and a lot of other opportunities ideas.
The Youths and Business
Before carrying out this interview, we had inquired about the composition of the congregants and had established that the youths constituted the bulk of members. We therefore tailor made our presentation for this particular sector. We tackled Tourism and Opportunities, Start Up companies, Virtual Zimbabwe Opportunities and a lot more.
Identifying Opportunities on your own
Identifying opportunities is your own responsibility, there is no school on identifying opportunities. One must develop skills of identifying opportunities in the economy and we gave numerous examples of how this is done and enjoyed the participation of congregants on this topic. A hands on approach and we gave relevant examples of our experience at Makoni Shopping Centre and what we had already identified in the 5 minutes we were there.
Follow Ups from the presentation
Looks like one and a half hours was not enough despite the speed of delivery and the handouts we had prepared in advance. ZBIN has therefore been invited for a follow up visit at the same venue. Before we visit them again, we will follow up on the funding opportunities that members need to apply for before the closure of due dates. We will also follow up with free Online Forex Trading for youths, add interested members to our ZBIN platforms and share the small business ideas that we promised.
So there is an acute lack of information on opportunities that are available in the economy, most youths still do not have access of information of where to get funding, where or how to access markets. Radios and newspapers are trying their best to provide information but how effective is this medium of information dissemination? If people in Chitungwiza with easy access to information through radios, television and newspapers have little knowledge of opportunities-how about someone in remote areas of the country?
So more work required by policy makers and media practioners to find out whether business information is trickling to the ordinary person. To Pastor Zulu, we really thank him for affording us this opportunity to come and help Zimbabweans to appreciate the importance of having access to valuable business information. We are glad to have played a small part in the transformation of the minds of Chitungwiza residents in relation to business opportunities that exist under the current economic environment. Its not all gloom and doom when you have access to information such as funding and access to markets!
