Nolwazi* lives in a township in South Africa. She works in the informal sector and was recently turned down for a loan of $80,000.



Having heard her story, I can’t understand why she was denied the loan. And I think this is indicative of why African entrepreneurs have more advantages than ever.



If you think you’d have taken the same decision as the bank, I need to add a few more details.



Nolwazi might live in one of the poorer areas of South Africa, but she is certainly not poor. She chooses to live there as she can run a thriving backroom rental business.



She started out renting one room from her formal dwelling but now lives in a property where she can rent out 11 units at a time. She also owns a second property which she rents out to students. Her average backroom income is now approximately $8,000 per month, which is probably substantially more than the bank manager who declined her loan application.



She wanted the loan to build student accommodation on land she already owned next to a major university.



After six weeks of deliberation, the bank turned down her application.



The story doesn’t finish here because Nolwazi decided to run an experiment.



She went to a different branch of the same bank and, applied for a car loan of $80,000 for a new Mercedes. It was approved in 20 minutes.



Why would a bank prefer to lend $80,000 for something that depreciates when they could have taken the safer bet of funding a valid capital-based business enterprise?



It was GG Alcock, best-selling author of Kasinomics, who got me thinking about the answer to this question when he drew my attention to this and other stories from township entrepreneurs.



The backroom rental industry, which Nolwazi forms part of, is estimated to generate over R50 billion ($2.6 billion) per annum, as owners rent out their rooms for accommodation, storage, corner shops (spazas), garages, takeaways, workshops, hair salons, beauty parlors and other services.



Nolwazi’s story isn’t, therefore, unique. It’s an allegory that showcases how vibrant the informal sector is and why millions of Africans are choosing to stay in townships, either for cheaper rents or to run their own entrepreneurial ventures.



And it’s a story that supports my view that local African entrepreneurs have never had so much opportunity, for two key reasons.



The first is that big businesses will always find it challenging to identify and exploit the informal sector because of a mix of prejudice and ignorance.



I’m speaking from experience here, as in all of my years working in financial services, I can’t remember ever being asked to investigate opportunities in the informal sector. Instead, established businesses are predisposed to focus on improving what they have, whereas entrepreneurs are the only people looking to solve existing problems in new markets.



The second reason entrepreneurs will win in these markets is because of the democratization of virtually everything you now need to run a successful business.



This is a relatively new phenomenon which is being driven by the confluence of improved technologies, more financing options and the ability to access skilled labor from anywhere on the planet.



And if you need a guiding hand that helps you navigate every step from idea to IPO, hundreds of African-based incubators and accelerators are now designed to help you do exactly that.



What was once the preserve of the wealthiest companies in the wealthiest countries is now accessible in virtually every major African city. Simply put, if you identify an opportunity and have enough grit and determination to give it a go, it’s never been easier to convert your dream into reality.



Oh, and if you were wondering what happened to Nolwazi, I’m happy to report she eventually did receive her loan.



And no, it was not provided by one of the large incumbent banks.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="15" height="14" src="">The opportunity for African entrepreneurs has never been so great.

Suburb in Soweto township

New Advantages And OpportunitiesFor African Entrepreneurs

Isaac Oladipupo, the CEO of Afrilearn, co-founded the edtech startup with Gabriel Olatunji-Legend in 2019 with a bold vision: to provide affordable, world-class education for Africans anywhere.



For millions of children and young people in Africa, access to quality education is often limited by factors such as poverty, conflict, distance, and lack of infrastructure. To address this challenge, Afrilearn CEO, Isaac Oladipupo and co-founder Gabriel Olatunji-Legend drew inspiration from their own experiences to create something innovative.



According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), 98 million children in sub-Saharan Africa are out of school, and many more are enrolled in schools that fail to provide them with the skills and knowledge they need to succeed in life.



Revolutionizing education in Africa with a gamified learn-and-earn feature, Afrilearn provides curriculum-relevant class notes, exam practice, animated video lessons, and a personalized learning dashboard that enable elementary and high school students (ages 6-18) to study easily and “achieve exam success in a single sitting”.



The inspiration behind Afrilearn came from the founders’ personal experiences of the educational challenges faced by students in Nigeria and across Africa.



“Imagine a world where every child, no matter their background or location, has full access to quality education and the tools to prepare them for lifelong success. That vision is what inspired the birth of Afrilearn,” Oladipupo tells FORBES AFRICA.



“When my exceptional co-founder Gabriel Olatunji-Legend and I struck out to build Afrilearn in 2019, we observed that for most young Africans, quality education is largely unaffordable, inaccessible and boring. Having personally witnessed the severe educational challenges faced by students in Nigeria and across Africa, resulting in high level of illiteracy, poor school grades, and failed dreams – we recognized the need for an urgent solution. We realized that technology offered the best opportunity to solve this challenge for generations to come, and Afrilearn was created to bridge this gap,&#8221; says Oladipupo.



One of the unique features of Afrilearn is that it offers both free and subscription-based accounts for its users. This means that students can access most of the platform’s content without paying anything.



However, if they want to enjoy exclusive benefits such as downloadable class notes, instant homework help with detailed explanations, coding lessons, live classes, personalized learning plans and much more, they can opt for a paid subscription.



“Our commitment to inclusivity led us to introduce free accounts, ensuring that no child is left behind due to financial constraints. Today, Afrilearn is widely renowned as the free, fun and effective app for the best school grades, uniting learners from top private schools, public schools, underserved communities, and even homeschoolers. We have evolved into a driving force for educational equity, turning learning into a joyful journey and transforming lives one lesson at a time.



“Revenue generated from subscriptions helps us continuously improve and expand our offerings, ensuring that Afrilearn remains a sustainable and impactful platform,” says Oladipupo.



Support from notable organizations, including United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the African Union (AU) and the Kingdom of the Netherlands, has enabled Afrilearn to further develop its content library, ensuring that it aligns with the national curricula and meets the highest educational standards globally.



“It has facilitated partnerships with schools and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), enabling us to reach even more students in need,” says Oladipupo.



He adds: “Beyond financial assistance, the backing of these organizations has also bolstered our credibility and reputation, attracting more educators and experts to collaborate with us. This network effect has elevated Afrilearn’s influence in the education sector, amplifying our mission to provide free, world-class education for Africans, anywhere.”



However, more support is needed to introduce more advanced courses and specialized subjects to cater to the diverse interests and career aspirations of students globally.



Oladipupo envisions the platform’s role in shaping the future of learning: “Every child deserves the opportunity to experience Afrilearn and our ultimate goal is to serve the world. We will continue to expand our content library, covering a broader range of subjects and topics.



“To this end, we are actively seeking collaborations and partnerships with educational institutions, governments, and organizations. Through strategic alliances, we aim to reach more students and expand our impact on the education sector. We envision a future where access to quality education is no longer a privilege but a fundamental right for every child.”



Oladipupo recalls with fond memories, some success stories of users, including students, teachers and parents: “I remember Adeola, who cleared her West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) in one sitting and is now pursuing her dream of becoming a software developer. A teacher, Abdullahi, shared with us how he experienced improved classroom engagement and student performance after using Afrilearn’s resources. The Osagie family, homeschooling their children, consider our platform a valuable educational partner tailored to each child’s learning needs,” he says.



“The joy and transformation we witness in the lives of students, teachers, and parents motivate us to push the boundaries of educational innovation further. Afrilearn’s impact extends beyond the classroom, empowering individuals to realize their full potential and become agents of positive change in their communities.”

Isaac Oladipupo; image credit Afrilearn 1

Beyond The Classroom: Nigerian Edtech Entrepreneur’s Aim ‘To Serve The World’

For the first time on the African continent, the Forbes Under 30 Summit Africa kicked off in Botswana’s capital Gaborone yesterday, April 24, with 600 entrepreneurs in attendance for the five-day event.



At the opening night in Gaborone’s historic Main Mall, an outdoor shopping and commercial hub in the heart of the city, an audience of about 2,000, including summit delegates and members of the public, cheered and swayed to live music.



The country’s President Mokgweetsi Masisi, who&nbsp;took to the podium for the welcome speech, was greeted by more applause and celebratory ululations.



“Some of the finest under-30s that the world of entrepreneurship has to offer [are here], with 200 from Botswana, 200 from the rest of Africa and another 200 from the rest of the world… We will witness for the first time how Botswana harnesses the power of the entrepreneurial spirit and promotes conversations that foster innovations and creativity… In Botswana, the youth, being change-makers and future leaders, are continuously encouraged to play a leading role through various funding mechanisms from public to private sources… we have also embarked on digitization as the epicenter of our national development agenda and young people are being empowered through several initiatives,” said Masisi.



For the many watching, this was “a people’s concert” held in a place of significance.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



“The Main Mall is the original mall built after independence. A lot of us grew up here,” remarked Pat Dambe, Head of Corporate Affairs at the De Beers Group of Companies in Botswana.



The crowds gathered outside the Cresta President Hotel, overlooking the main stage.&nbsp;



“The President Hotel is a legacy hotel. And our President wanted to bring everybody back to where we started and it really is a renaissance. It’s a rebirth. And it’s all about young people, so it’s also the future. We are so excited to see the buildings around that have been upgraded,” added Dambe.



In the crowd, Kemo Kwadiba, the Managing Director of Care Medicals Botswana and one of the 200 entrepreneurs from Botswana sponsored by De Beers and the country to experience the summit, was ecstatic as local hip hop artist ATI took to the stage for an energetic performance.



“I am very keen to meet with entrepreneurs from Africa and the world at the summit; I want to share notes with them, all the way from here to Kasane, where I will be attending the second leg of the summit,” said Kwadiba.



Yet another young businessman in the crowd, Botsile Tshepo Moreba, the owner of Sanctified Delights Bakery in Bobonong, a&nbsp;small town in the country’s Central District, drove five hours to get here.



“I am not an Under 30 lister, but I feel like one,” he said.



Lenny Motshodi, a small-scale farmer who mainly sells lettuce, said he too was looking forward to mingle with other agri-preneurs in the audience.



Similar sentiments from summit attendee, Busi Pooe, the CEO of Tshimong in South Africa and also FORBES AFRICA’s 2019 30 Under 30 lister: “Tonight was hugely inspirational. I had the opportunity to reconnect with past FORBES AFRICA Under 30s from all over the African continent who&#8217;ve been recognized for their potential, and have actually gone on to realize it. President Masisi commented that Africa&#8217;s time is now and the youth are in the driving seat. I&#8217;m excited for the next few days of networking as it will continue to build on the momentum set tonight.”&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;



Just before Ghana’s DJ Black made his way to the stage for his much-awaited show, President Masisi concluded his speech, summing up the mood of the night: “My wife and I are in our dancing shoes and we are ready to rock!”

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An African Night Celebrating Global Entrepreneurship  

Globally, ingredients for most perfumes are often imported from small suppliers in Africa, processed, and then re-exported into the commercial market of their country of origin as the finished product. Now, the continent is beginning to look inward to explore and support ways that local production can be encouraged in furthering the olfactory story of Africa.



BY ALASTAIR HAGGER



TO BREATHE the heady scent of red soil after heavy rainfall is to understand that even the African air itself can smell like heaven.



But for hundreds of years, Africa has also been sharing its evocative fragrance ingredients with the world: fresh, sour orange blossoms from the north; warm and woody myrrh from the east; musky hyraceum (Africa Stone) from the south; floral, sugary ylang ylang from the west.



The global perfume industry is worth around $50 billion, and is dominated by the Western fragrance titans we see glamorously and beguilingly advertised in every multiplex pre-movie advertising segment. Many of these perfume houses own the facilities to extract and distil the essential oils and aromatic compounds that comprise your favorite fragrance’s unmistakeable ‘accord’ of base, middle and top notes. These ingredients are often imported from small suppliers in Africa, processed, and then re-exported into the commercial market of their country of origin as the finished product: the equivalent of me baking a loaf of bread, selling it to you, and then buying it back at a premium, repackaged as a sandwich.



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="alignright size-full is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.09.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-53081" width="380" height="462" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.09.jpg 841w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.09-246x300.jpg 246w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.09-768x935.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 380px) 100vw, 380px" /></figure></div>



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote has-text-align-center is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">Flush with the realization that quality is not the reserve of large corporations, I set out to find small-scale farmers and artisanal distillers of essential oils in South Africa. In the process I built up a collection of ingredients that are unique to our continent.<cite> Marie Aoun</cite></blockquote>



Three market disruptors with African roots are looking to reconfigure the way we think about our relationship with perfume by instead placing African ingredients front and center in their products’ identities, and challenging some of the industry’s unsustainable and environmentally disruptive processes that don’t always smell quite so sweet.



Marie Aoun is the owner of South African parfumerie Saint d’Ici, which uses African plants “to create perfumes from botanical extracts in the form of absolutes, CO2 extracts, tinctures and essential oils.” While taking a course in Italy with the natural perfumer Dominique Dubrana, Aoun understood that locally sourced ingredients provided fragrance distillations equal or superior to those of the most highly-regarded French perfume houses.



“This process was pure magic,” she says. “Flush with the realization that quality is not the reserve of large corporations, I set out to find small-scale farmers and artisanal distillers of essential oils in South Africa. In the process I built up a collection of ingredients that are unique to our continent.”



These scent-rich raw materials include mopane (balsam tree), African bluegrass (part of the lemongrass family), and the fine-leaved fynbos indigenous to the Western and Eastern Capes. 



“At first, these were tricky to work with, and it took me a while to understand how to incorporate them into a western style of perfumery,” Aoun says. “Once I learned to love them, I realized how essential they were to creating perfume with a sense of place. Hence the name Saint d’Ici: ‘of here’.”



While it remains impossible to source every ingredient from Africa, due to specific geographies, the continent is beginning to look inward to explore and support ways that local production can be encouraged.



“Although South Africa is not a giant in the international essential oil industry, it is still a player,” says Aoun. “The South African government also incentivized essential oil production for cooperatives and small-scale farmers, so there has been a fair amount of experimentation with a broad range of plants. In many ways, I’m in a lucky geography that enables me to source a fair amount locally.”



At the heart of Aoun’s work is a commitment to ensuring that her perfumes are produced not only with locally-sourced ingredients, but also in a manner that respects their original integrity and the environment from which they emerged. The components of her perfume bottles are all recyclable and reusable, and the key ‘carrier’ for fragrant oils and compounds, alcohol, is utilized in a way that runs counter to convention.



“The contemporary perfume industry is built on industrial- scale synthesized molecules that are heavily marketed to appear as a luxury good,” she says. “I steer clear of so-called natural isolates and prefer to pay the high taxes for an alcohol that has not been denatured (the process by which alcohol’s characteristic molecular properties are destroyed in order to discourage ingestion). In many ways, the loudness of single molecules is what defines modern perfumery – but I only work with subtler ‘whole’ ingredients. Although some people respond to the perfumes deeply, like a homecoming, others need time. I refer to this as a process of unlearning.”



Northwards now up the briny Atlantic to London, where the Swedish-born perfumer Maya Njie creates fragrances shaped and influenced by her “esoteric” Gambian heritage.



With a background in surface design and photography, her journey into the world of perfume began with experiments that incorporated scent in her art projects. “I had a desire to tell an olfactory story through smells, and align it with my visual designs,” she says. “The starting point was my heritage – my grandfather’s home, or the smell of wood, leather and incense in craft markets in Serrekunda. I started blending oils that reminded me of these places and scented my work, and this became my ‘multi-sensory extension’, if you like.”



She is mindful of the wider industry’s noisome impact on the natural environment, as the accumulation of raw materials and production of perfume ingredients has traditionally involved heavy deforestation and the use of fossil fuels in distillation and extraction processes. Maya Njie Perfumes is supporting Ecologi, a reforestation and carbon reduction social enterprise, “as a way of lowering my CO2 emissions in the UK but also to help them in their worldwide quest. They plant trees, most recently in Uganda, and support forest restoration in Kenya,” she says.



Now that her brand is established in the west, Njie is aiming to strengthen ties with the continent that inspires many of her creations. “I was searching for local farmers when I was in Gambia last, and will continue to do so,” she says. “I am also very much open to working with niche perfume outlets in Africa, <meta charset="utf-8">looking to widen my range of stockists as I grow.” Back in red-soiled Botswana, entrepreneur Thamani <meta charset="utf-8">Thothe harnesses the natural qualities of the humble marula tree in her brand White Label Fragrances. The juicy, stickily aromatic marula fruit, which can be seen decorating the ground like globs of green toffee at the height of the Botswana summer, can be pressed to make a luxurious carrier oil for perfumes, and other cosmetics such as body oil.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote has-text-align-center is-style-default is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">The starting point was my heritage – my grandfather’s home, or the smell of wood, leather and incense in craft markets in Serrekunda.<cite> Maya Njie</cite></blockquote>



“Some people are allergic to the ethanol used in fragrances, so we create scents using essential oils and replace the ethanol with marula oil,” Thothe says. She was inspired to start the company in 2017, with a long-term vision of creating a business which is truly African in its scope and ambition.



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="alignleft size-full is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.47.png" alt="" class="wp-image-53082" width="293" height="372" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.47.png 470w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.47-237x300.png 237w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 293px) 100vw, 293px" /></figure></div>



“I think I didn’t like the idea of looking at a fragrance advert, and it being very European or westernized,” she says. “I understood that there are ingredients in Botswana and in Africa that we can use for our products, and that’s when I started exploring the ingredients that we have locally: we use Kalahari melon seeds, we use acacia, we use African rose, we use myrrh from Namibia. But there’s so much that we need to explore. We still don’t have an infrastructure that allow us to extract oils naturally, and for us to be able to distil them properly to international standards. So, this is why, right now, it was important for me have a hand in the value chain of the business.”



Thothe is Chairperson of the Cosmetic Sector of the Natural Products Association of Botswana, and is currently working on projects designed to eventually lead to the establishment of essential oil distilleries in the country.



“I’ve realized the importance of the power that we have as a business, to empower other people to have their own businesses,” she says. “We want to develop communities that have potential, look for areas that are rich in these plants, and create an industry in that area where the community can actually benefit from that distillery.”



This determination to carve out territory, in a market that can be exploitative and dismissive towards the continent to which it owes so much, could be a powerful catalyst for lasting change in the industry – and has much wider cultural implications.



“In Africa, we are given a lot of stuff to use, stuff to wear, which we just sort of adopt,” Thothe says. “We don’t have an image of our own. I felt it was very important, as someone who’s pioneering this in Botswana, to show that’s it’s possible to have a luxury African product that can stand at the same level. It’s high time that businesses like mine show fellow Africans that we can do it.”



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-full is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.16.png" alt="" class="wp-image-53083" width="501" height="405" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.16.png 906w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.16-300x243.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-2021-10-21-at-14.36.16-768x622.png 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 501px) 100vw, 501px" /></figure></div>

Close of multi racial girl applying perfume to her neck

The Smell Of Money: The Growth of the Blooming Perfume Industry in Africa

Temitope Mayegun has made a name in Nigeria selling natural oils from fruits, seeds and vegetables, but it was a greasy path to follow.



From stock trading to skincare, in the last four years, Temitope Mayegun has built a company that sells what she calls “natural skincare products” but to achieve that, she first needed to change the mindset of Nigerians.&nbsp;&nbsp;



“I got divine inspiration,” she says, “to start a company that will enrich lives and inspire a healthier and happier world.” The founder and CEO of Avila Naturalle in Nigeria felt she needed to first educate people about the toxic and unsafe chemicals they were hitherto using for bleaching and skin whitening, considering how sought-after they are in Nigeria.



The former stock broker was also frustrated she couldn’t find an all-natural skin product without bleaching or whitening ingredients harmful to the skin, so she created her own.



Today, from a humble start in 2017, her company retails over 350 products in the skincare division, 90 products in the food division and 10 products in the water and drinks division.



But it took a lot of ground work and research to start with.



“I saw that many people believe your skincare product should enhance or change your skin color,” recalls Mayegun.



With a degree in accounting from the University of Lagos as well as an International Masters in Business Administration from Eaton Business School; and having done a Harvard Business School Executive Leadership course, Mayegun’s most valuable qualification would prove to be a diploma she obtained in an organic and natural skin school in London.



Equipped with the knowledge of the goodness of natural products, Mayegun set out on the cumbersome path of changing perceptions.



“It was difficult because a lot of people were not ready to change their bleaching and whitening products. So, we did not follow the crowd even though there was pressure to go into whitening and pressure to create products that will let customers bleach their skin,” says Mayegun.



To combat stereotypes, Mayegun knew she had to create a unique product. She began with 30,000 units of pure coconut oil.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“I had to create campaigns to educate the public on the importance of using natural products.”</blockquote>



“At the time, there was no pure coconut oil on the market. Most of them were watered down with other edible oils which reduces the quality. I had to create campaigns to educate the public on the importance of using natural products and sell them on the superior quality of our products.”



The hard work paid off and Mayegun sold out her 30,000 units, which was two cartons of pure coconut oil, in just two days. It was time to expand her business and with that, she needed to find capital.



“I started asking friends for a loan but I could not raise the money. I went to microfinance companies looking for a $10,000-loan and they said I needed collateral which I didn’t have.



“There were times when I worked between 17 and 21 hours a day. I would be trying to convince people on why they should use coconut oil for their skin. I knew people were not ready for natural products but I kept pushing and after a while, I got a lot of people asking for coconut oil and it was not easy meeting the demand,” says Mayegun.



Soon, word got out and the distributors came calling. Today, Avila Naturalle offers multiple natural essential oils made from carrots, avocado, hibiscus and mustard.



“When people saw our mustard oil, they were shocked that there were these oils in Nigeria. So, they bought in bulk to resell. We were the first to produce essential oils in Nigeria. People were asking if we bought them from abroad and dilute it with other products which was the norm. We are the only company that sells 100% pure natural oils from fruits and seeds.”



The sizeable beauty and personal care market in Nigeria is what Mayegun has sets her sights on.



“To make this happen we have created a multi-channel natural body care and household brand with multiple product lines, which combines a dynamic distribution network with a retail strategy as well as e-commerce,” she says, also referring to changing consumer habits in the post-Covid world.



With just $100 and a burgeoning global supply chain network, Mayegun has built a million-dollar company manufacturing natural body and hair care products and foods in Africa.

temitope mayegun

The Natural Route To Business Success

27 years of South African democracy and 27 years of Wiphold, which broke barriers and brought black South African women into the mainstream. FORBES AFRICA spoke to its co-founder and corporate leader Louisa Mojela, also about her new doctorate degree and what’s limiting female entrepreneurs.



Just as South Africa is set to observe Freedom Day on April 27, we look at Wiphold or the Women Investment Portfolio Holdings, one of the country’s best-known first generation empowerment companies owned and led by women.



Founded just weeks before a free South Africa was emerging from the dark shadows of the apartheid in 1994, it gave financial power to grassroots black South African women, driving broad-based economic empowerment, and among other milestones, it also became the first women-only empowerment company to list on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in 1999.



One of South Africa&#8217;s most accomplished leaders in business, Louisa Mojela, the Group CEO and co-founder of Wiphold, was recently awarded a doctorate degree by the faculty of economic and management sciences at Stellenbosch University in Cape Town for her leadership in establishing platforms to empower women in Africa.



In this interview with FORBES AFRICA, she shares some “transformative and impactful” anecdotes on the beginnings of Wiphold, which she started as part of the ‘Wip Four’ including Gloria Serobe, Wendy Luhabe and Nomhle Canca – and how it has stayed the course.



One of the main focus areas for the company currently is agriculture.



“We have incorporated that sector into our strategy and encourage our women shareholders that we support them in attaining the dream of food security,” says Mojela, who also graced the cover of FORBES WOMAN AFRICA in 2014.



Mojela also founded Bophelo BioScience &amp; Wellness in 2018 in Lesotho (focusing on medicinal cannabis), and is now creating new social and transformational development opportunities in the growing cannabis sector.



In this interview, she also speaks about the future of women’s entrepreneurship on the African continent. “To the women, I say, turn obstacles into opportunities. Success is never easy, it’s a long road.”



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
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</div><figcaption>Edited by Chanel Retief</figcaption></figure>

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Lessons From Wiphold’s Louisa Mojela On Turning Obstacles Into Opportunities

Two African entrepreneurs in the United Kingdom. One tale of grit and gumption in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic. 



IN 2019, WHEN BERNICIA BOATENG OPENED HER namesake makeup studio, Bernicia Boateng Studios, in London’s high street, it made her the first Ghanaian to do so. Her makeup business had grown considerably over the years, as she cultivated some big names as her clientele including, as she says, Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and models Leomie Anderson and Jourdan Dunn.



She was beginning to be recognized for her work with features in publications such as Vogue and collaborations with beauty and fashion houses such as Estée Lauder and Yves Saint Laurent. When the BBC and Evening Standard were looking for a voice representing excellence in the makeup industry, Boateng was the go-to name. But then came the pandemic, the lockdowns, the second wave, and a twist in the fairy tale. 



“When I realized that face-to-face contact wasn’t something we can rely on anymore, I kind of moved the brand towards education,” says Boateng, on her decision to strategize to survive. But how did she end up in the beauty business in the United Kingdom (UK)? 



“I have always wanted to be a makeup artist because my mum loved makeup and it was something I always found desirable. I wanted to be just like my mum who was a very glamorous woman. I remember she would take us to Selfridges (high-end department store) on the weekends after drama school and she would make us sit down and watch as she got her makeup done and that is where I got interested,” says Boateng. 



Those were the days before YouTube and social media makeup tutorials when the only way one could hone the craft was by rolling up the sleeves and learning on the job or from a professional on the shop floor. And that is exactly what Boateng did. 



After graduating with a business management degree from the University of Leicester in the UK, Boateng got her first job with Mac Cosmetics as a makeup artist, before branching out to become her own professional. 



“2011 and 2012 [were the years] makeup took over and it was all over social media with videos on how to recreate makeup and I just realized that there was a gap in the market in terms of doing a luxury makeup look for dark-skinned girls and I wanted to fill that void,” she says of the early years. 



But now, in order to fill the void created by the pandemic, she has had to give her business an even bigger digital persona. 



“When it first hit, the first thing I thought of was taking my work online. A lot of people still want to look good at home and we don’t have a lot of control about where we can go or where we can eat but one thing we do have control over is how we look, how we make ourselves feel, and how we make other people feel. So, it was imperative to show people how to look and feel good,” says Boateng. 



<div class="wp-block-media-text alignwide is-stacked-on-mobile" style="grid-template-columns:26% auto"><figure class="wp-block-media-text__media"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="927" height="1024" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Boateng-927x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-50782 size-full" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Boateng-927x1024.jpg 927w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Boateng-272x300.jpg 272w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Boateng-768x848.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Boateng-1391x1536.jpg 1391w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Boateng.jpg 1476w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 927px) 100vw, 927px" /></figure><div class="wp-block-media-text__content">
<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">We don’t have a lot of control about where we can go or where we can eat but one thing we do have control over is how we look. – Bernicia Boateng</blockquote>
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She began with online tutorials that did so well that they were covered by the BBC. She also began creating more content establishing a more personal rapport with her 115,000-strong Instagram audience, taking them on a journey to enhancing their self-esteem. The result of these initiatives means Boateng has now found a new revenue stream to stay afloat. 



But who knows for how long until the pandemic ebbs away? With the UK experiencing harsh restrictions, startups have all either had to fold up, pivot or start all over. 



Take for example, Brimms Bottles Limited, founded by P.Y. Adjei, which had to adapt almost immediately to the new economic climate. After graduating from the University of Greenwich, Adjei worked in the banking sector for about five years before listening to his inner entrepreneurial voice. 



He began by creating content for a number of magazines before launching his own publication, which he ran for a few years. With Brexit gaining momentum, Adjei had his eureka moment during a chance encounter with a friend that led him all the way to China in search of greener pastures. 



“My time there influenced what I am doing today because I got a chance to meet a number of manufacturers and from there, I came across what I thought was a brilliant product,” says Adjei. 



That product was a stainless-steel bottle that kept a drink warm for 12 hours or cold for a whole day. 



“It looked beautiful to me and the only thing missing was the product packaging. It was mainly boring colors and that is where my creative direction kicked in. I wanted the bottles to have a better design and style and from there I started working on the idea and trying to see what I could do, design-wise, to improve it and build the product and here I am today.” 



<div class="wp-block-media-text alignwide is-stacked-on-mobile" style="grid-template-columns:38% auto"><figure class="wp-block-media-text__media"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Adjei-1024x683.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-50781 size-full" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Adjei-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Adjei-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Adjei-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Adjei-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Adjei-2048x1365.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure><div class="wp-block-media-text__content">
I remember going to see my manufacturer in Germany and they were holding a conference in Frankfurt and we got there and realized that the place was completely empty and that is where I saw how serious [Covid-19] was and how it would impact business. – P.Y. Adjei We
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But nobody could have foreseen the body blows of Covid-19.



&#8220;Brimms Bottles kicked off right at the beginning of the pandemic and I remember going to see my manufacturer in Germany and they were holding a conference in Frankfurt and we got there and realized that the place was completely empty and that is where I saw how serious this was and how it would impact business,” says Adjei. 



His problems were just about to begin. He experienced undue delays for the samples he had ordered of Brimms Bottles due to lockdowns implemented all over the world. 



“But we managed to work through that during the sample stage but finally when we got the final order in, that got delayed as well, taking about three to four months from China because of the pandemic,” says Adjei. 



Initially, the idea was to have his products at a few outlets such as cafes and were also meant for outdoor activities and travels, all of which were unduly affected by the pandemic. Now, he is leaning more towards the e-commerce aspect of the business. 



“I used my unique skills in terms of content creation and web design to make sure that my website works perfectly and to make sure I am working to get my products out there. “I am also branching into co-branding which allows a company or individual to create their bottles and co-brand along with mine so I am diversifying to give the bottles other avenues to survive,” says Adjei. 



Going digital is the only way forward for Adjei, Boateng, and many other startup entrepreneurs in the diaspora who had just begun on their journey in business, and have had to script their own rulebooks of survival. Their story is no different from their counterparts across the world. It’s one of grit, gumption and the fortitude to stay the course, no matter what.

Close-Up Of Small Shopping Boxes With Credit Card On Laptop

Survivors And Thrivers In Business

After more than a decade of trying to persuade authorities of the value of teaching entrepreneurship in schools, Lydia Zingoni, founder of the Teen Entrepreneur concept, is starting to make some headway.



By Nick Said



South Africa has targeted the creation of one million new entrepreneurs by 2030, but a schooling system, says Lydia Zingoni, weighed down by a lack of resources, infrastructure and a curriculum that focuses on traditional subject matter makes that seemingly a pipe dream.



Zingoni, founder of the Teen Entrepreneur concept, is hoping to change that and after more than a decade of trying to persuade authorities of the value of teaching entrepreneurship in schools, is starting to make some headway.



“The person you want in 2030 to be creating a business is likely in school at this time somewhere in South Africa,” Zingoni tells FORBES AFRICA. “You need to reach them now in order to create that mindset and begin to build the support structure around them.”&nbsp;



Zingoni, who was born in Zimbabwe but has lived and worked in London and now Cape Town for almost three decades, is hoping to revolutionize this space in South Africa and beyond its borders to across the African continent. &nbsp;



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="alignright size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Lydia4.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-50758" width="414" height="276" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Lydia4.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Lydia4-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Lydia4-768x512.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 414px) 100vw, 414px" /></figure></div>



“I came to realize this need when I was working for CPUT [Cape Peninsula University of Technology] as the director of information and libraries, and four young people came to my office and said, ‘look, we know we are not going to get jobs, we want information [on opening their own business].



“This was back in 2006 when internet resources and opportunities [for online learning] were obviously far less developed.”



Zingoni recognized a growing desire among young people to cut their own path in business, but there was little practical support from institutions.&nbsp;



She also believed these learnings should start much earlier, before tertiary education, and that schools would be an essential breeding ground for entrepreneurs.



She stepped up her plans in 2009 to form Teen Entrepreneur, a non-profit organization, and went to the Department of Education to push for a program in schools that would expose learners to the idea of entrepreneurship and help them develop their concepts.



“They were not really interested, they said, ‘science and maths is really what is important, entrepreneurship is not what we are focussing on’. So I decided to go it alone and left CPUT to create Teen Entrepreneur, which has involved advocating and creating programs to support young people in developing business ideas and skills.”



The plan is to create entrepreneur ‘societies’ in schools where learners can develop their own ideas and get the support they need to turn them into practical businesses.



“It is easier said than done,” Zingoni admits. “You can go to a school and talk to the kids for 10 minutes in assembly, but then what? You are not going to convince them that way.”



Zingoni instead approached schools to create a lesson outside of normal hours with up to 50 learners taking part. But it has been painstaking work.&nbsp;



“We have a program that has 11 modules, but the core is how do you come up with a business idea. If you are in Khayelitsha [a township in South Africa’s Western Cape province] or wherever, it is not just in major centers where entrepreneurship is an option.&nbsp;



“Look within your local community, use your passion and talent to see how you can solve your own community’s problems. Obviously, there is a social element to it, but it must have a financial gain to convince young people that entrepreneurship is an option.”



Teen Entrepreneur also hosts weekend programs, monthly indabas and conferences that are in addition to the work they do in schools.



“It has been a slow process. Very slow in fact. The hardest thing has been convincing policy-makers that we need to expose young people to an entrepreneurial mindset and culture.



But we are getting to where we want to be, although obviously the Covid-19 pandemic has set us back this past year,” Zingoni says.



“We are now working with the Eastern Cape government, who love our program. The Department of Education is also now finally running what they call the E3 program [Entrepreneurship, Education, Employability] and they have partnered with us on this. That has given us access to all South African [government] schools. If there was no Covid, we would have already rolled out that program.”



But the reach into schools across the country presents a massive logistical challenge, and that is where Teen Entrepreneur has turned to technology.



“If we went into every school, it would mean I am in charge of 27,000 teachers who will present the program,” Zingoni says. “Then multiply that by may be 50 learners in each program… it is a massive reach.



“In 2016, we decided to create a digital platform for the program, where we could refer the teachers to the portal [to get the information they need]. It took until 2019 to find a partner to assist us, and that was the University of Cape Town’s computer department.



“Schools can now get all the information they need online and create their own entrepreneurship societies in that environment.”



Zingoni says the program grapples with topics very much relevant to the world of today. &nbsp;&nbsp;



“Sustainability, the environment and climate change are factors we delve into, and it is about creating businesses that are cognizant of these issues.”



She adds they have already received interest from outside of South Africa in their program, and the decision to go digital has opened other doors.



“This is not just a South African issue, it is an African problem,” she says. “We have had interest from Tanzania, Kenya, Togo… now you can learn online, it is possible to have the program in these countries and it costs nothing to take part.”

Lydia3

How To Become A CEO At 16

Chika Madubuko is using technology to connect the at-home elderly to trained care-givers in Nigeria.



THE GLOBAL DIGITAL HEALTH MARKET IS growing by leaps and bounds and billions, and Chika Madubuko, the CEO and Founder of Greymate Care, is wanting to make the most of it whilst creating impact. With money not the only objective, it was the opportunity to serve those who needed quality healthcare the most that guided her.



Born in the northern region of Nigeria, Madubuko attended the Nnamdi Azikiwe University in Anambra State, where she studied microbiology, before progressing to biotechnology and bioengineering at the University of Hertfordshire in the United Kingdom (UK). 



“All I wanted to do at the time is solve problems with bio-tech, with everyday biological systems, creating drugs and industrial solutions,” says Madubuko.



After graduating, the third-born child in a family of five children, decided to take a leaf out of her entrepreneurial parents’ handbook and venture into business development and sales in the UK before relocating to Nigeria to continue as a business development manager at Novus Agro, a multisided platform that organizes smallholder farmers into accessible groups for all those who want to transact with them.



By that stage, Madubuko had already caught the entrepreneurial bug and was looking for new direction. 



“When I was about to leave the UK, I toyed with the idea of creating a homecare startup and I was a certified care-giver but I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with it. Given my success in business development, I decided to give it a try and some people told me this was a real problem Nigerians were facing.”



The cultural norm in Nigeria is that when a loved one is sick, other members of the family take care of the person. Traditionally, this role was reserved for wives or mothers who stayed at home. However, with the significant gender shift in recent years and more women employed or entrepreneurial and no longer staying at home 24&#215;7, this has led to challenges for the elderly who need round-the-clock home care.



This is where Greymate Care comes in. Born out of the personal pain Madubuko faced when looking for a care-giver for her grandmother in the village, she based her service offering around providing trained professionals to care for vulnerable family members.



“Greymate Care is an online platform that connects the elderly to vetted care-givers right [in] the comfort of their homes… In Nigeria, there is no database where you can simply go and find a care-giver or someone who has been trained and background-checked. Greymate Care solves that problem by training people who want to become care givers and making sure they have guarantors and they are available to be deployed to your home. We reduce the turnaround time of finding a care-giver from about two months to let’s say an hour or maximum 48 hours.”



Each care-giver on the platform has to provide two references who act as guarantors for the individual and those references have to be in senior positions in credible organizations to qualify. That extra check has made Greymate Care a trusted provider in Nigeria, says Madubuko.



A recent article by Deloitte estimates that sub-Saharan Africa is forecast to become the fastest-growing region in the world in the area of e-health.



The proliferation of these services is mainly driven by rapid adaptation of mobile technology as well as the internet.



Deloitte estimates the mobile penetration rate for the continent is close to exceeding 80% with a large number of the population utilizing mobile phones for not only communication but also integrating business services.



Greymate Care is hoping to tap into this growing trend to provide access to health information and curb the shortage of good healthcare professionals especially in remote areas.



Greymate Care is hoping to tap into this growing trend to provide access to health information and curb the shortage of good healthcare professionals especially in remote areas.



For Madubuko, a major impetus for her new healthcare company is to provide employment through working with global agencies such as the United Nations Development Programme to train youth to become care-givers, an initiative that has created over 1,000 jobs on the e-health platform thus far.

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Meet The Entrepreneur Who Is Changing the Game In Geriatrics

London-based Ghanaian entrepreneur and computer science specialist Patrick Adom is inducting children into the fascinating world of jigsaw puzzles while teaching them about African culture.



AS COUNTRIES begin to grapple with the second wave of the Coronavirus pandemic, rapid adoption of activities outside the traditional content- streaming platforms is now beginning to gain traction.



The puzzles market is one such. Focusing on jigsaw and 3D puzzles as well as board games, it was estimated to be worth a staggering $11.88 billion globally in 2019 and on track to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 18.6% from 2020 to 2027, according to Grand View Research.



The lockdowns implemented the world over spelled disaster for many who lost their jobs and livelihoods.



But Patrick Adom, a computer science specialist, saw a silver lining. Inspired by his daughter, the IT professional decided to see it as an opportunity and take a chunk of the lucrative puzzles market with his African-inspired creation, Very Puzzled.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-style-large is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“Africans are patriotic and want to pass down their heritage to their family. So, our sales have grown..”</blockquote>



Known for its success in improved visual and enhanced cognitive skills, Adom wanted to create a jigsaw concept that not only helped people learn more about Africa and the African diaspora, but also something that was fun and engaging for the whole family.



“I wanted children to be able to also learn without realizing that they are learning anything, and [offer] something the family can do together and start a conversation and use that to do further exploration on their own,” says Adom.



<div class="wp-block-image is-style-default"><figure class="alignright size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Very-Puzzled_9-1024x683.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-50050" width="357" height="237" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Very-Puzzled_9-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Very-Puzzled_9-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Very-Puzzled_9-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Very-Puzzled_9-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Very-Puzzled_9-2048x1365.jpg 2048w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Very-Puzzled_9-600x400.jpg 600w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 357px) 100vw, 357px" /><figcaption>Photo supplied </figcaption></figure></div>



After graduating from Kingston University in the United Kingdom (UK), where he studied Computer and Information Systems in 2000, Adom continued his further education with an MBA in general management from Liverpool University before working in various roles within the IT industry.



But throughout his career, the entrepreneurial bug which bit him when in secondary school, where he would buy and sell hip-hop posters to his fellow classmates, was always looking for an awakening.



“I saw that there were not a lot of things around my daughter that focused on her cultural heritage and I thought jigsaw puzzles were an innovative route that nobody was doing. I found an illustrator and it so happened that the illustrator had a map of Africa that was very bright and colorful that resonated with me and so I reached out and asked if it could be customized for me.



“They agreed and I paid them and they delivered the customization I wanted. I then looked on a platform called Alibaba and from there, I was able to secure a manufacturer in China. I made 100 pieces to test the market and reached out to black-owned shops in London to generate buzz about the products and also using Instagram and social media to let people know about the product,” says Adom.



His hard work paid off. Very soon, the products were out and people were buying it.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-style-large is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“I made 100 pieces to test the market and reached out to black-owned shops in London.”</blockquote>



Now, Adom has his eyes set on raising further investment and funding to expand the company’s unique offering. He began drilling down and creating puzzles for other countries like his hometown Ghana, South Africa, and Jamaica. 



“Africans are patriotic and want to pass down their heritage to their family. So, our sales have grown and we continue to add more stockists to our list and that helps grow the business as well. We reached the bold decision to approach a number of premiership clubs to make their own jigsaw puzzles for them featuring their intellectual property and we got licensing agreements with four premiership clubs so that was a huge success for us,&#8221; says Adom. 



The move comes at a cost as Adom has to pay licensing fee to the clubs, a risky move but one he needs to make to help broaden the appeal to a wider pool of consumers, the key to draw in the ever-elusive tranche of investors who will eventually help his business scale, and he can make his own indelible mark on the map of Africa.

Patrick Adom

The Entrepreneur Who is Piecing Africa Together One Puzzle At a Time

All Omphile Magasa knew was baking, so the 30-year-old took to it as a full-time entrepreneur, and is perhaps one of the few to have tasted success in 2020.  



After losing her salaried job in 2017, Omphile Magasa had no choice but to wipe her tears and turn on the oven to bake. After all, she had to raise her daughter and had debts to pay. 



Magasa, founder of Baked By Opy, was born and raised in Mabeskraal, a small village an hour’s drive away from Rustenburg in South Africa’s North West province.



At the age of seven, Magasa inherited her grandmother’s passion and skill for baking. Raised by her grandparents, the young baker remembers how she was always assigned tasks to help her ‘grandma’.



“It got to a point where I was always craving cakes; always buying pre-mix products and I remembered that I grew up in a family where we baked all the time; we know how to make cakes from scratch,” says Magasa.



In 2015, three years into her IT career, she started making biscuits and cakes to sell at work for R100 or R150 ($7 or $11) a bucket for extra cash.



Magasa was then motivated to explore her baking skills. With the help of online tutorials, she baked a cake for her daughter’s first birthday. Magasa then posted a photograph of it on her social media accounts. This caught the attention of an old school mate who wanted a customized cake too.



This was her first official client, which led to the birth of Baked By Opy.



Unfortunately, Magasa lost her full-time job at the time.



“When you get retrenched, it’s something you never really expect, you think about your debts, child support and I started looking for another job, but my partner reminded me that I’ve been baking and I was probably retrenched because I was too focused on my baking,” she laughs.



“I started baking more, I started posting more on social media because I had more time, I took on more orders and the business started growing and I turned over about R17,000 in 2016/17.”



In 2020, Magasa says she felt the pinch of the lockdown in South Africa only during alert level five. However, business picked up rapidly when she got back to baking action in May. 



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">&#8220;Covid was a blessing in disguise&#8230;.&#8221;</blockquote>



“My business grew bigger during the lockdown. Covid was a blessing in disguise, everyone was home, including the kids, so parents would get customized cakes. Things just started going crazy, I even employed people. When businesses were retrenching, I was hiring and I still intend on hiring more people,” she says.



Magasa also employed an accountant to balance her books.



“My accountant was telling me that it’s important I register for VAT because the business is turning over a million now.”



With the festive season in South Africa, she is receiving multiple orders.



The customized delicacies range from R750 to R19,000 ($52 to $1,300).



From selling biscuits in a bucket, to packaging Christmas desserts for companies, her business has had a sweet ending this year.



<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>

Omphile Magasa

From A Childhood Hobby To Making Dough And A Sweet Year Ending

To improve Africa’s chances and ensure the safe storage of Covid-19 vaccines, Zeynep Harezi, and Karpowership based in Istanbul are working on innovative power generation solutions.



There is still a strong debate about Africa’s chances of receiving the Covid-19 vaccines when they become available in 2021: how will the continent store it?



Although organizations like GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, are closely working with global pharmaceutical giants like Pfizer and AstraZeneca to ensure that Africa does not get left behind, there are other important considerations the continent needs to consider when it comes to receiving inoculation.



One such factor is the availability of consistent power to keep the vaccines refrigerated in order to remain potent and safe. According to a Reuters report, most vaccines require cooling of between two and eight degrees Celsius with the Phase 1 trials of the Covid-19 vaccine requiring storage in an environment as low as -80 degrees Celsius.



According to the World Health Organization (WHO), an estimated 50% of all vaccines are destroyed due to issues like temperature control. To improve Africa’s chances and ensure the safe storage and implementation of the vaccines, Zeynep Harezi and her Karpowership organization is hoping to introduce innovative power generation solutions that will enable Africa to succeed in not only the fight against Covid-19 but also power infrastructure development.



The 32-year-old Turkish-born managing director of Karpowership has a background in philosophy and economics, having graduated with a master’s degree from the London School of Economics. Harezi once dreamed of becoming the president of Turkey when she was a child, a choice that was greatly influenced by the country’s first female prime minister at the time. But it was her uncle who would set her sights on helping Africa improve its power infrastructure.



“When I was six years old, my uncle would tell me that he was going to build power plants inside ships and send them to countries all over the world. But he would also tell me about the mermaids in Atlantis so I was never sure where the line of reality was and where it was just story-telling,” recalls Harezi.



But her uncle’s stories were not tall tales after all. In 1996, the family-owned business entered the energy sector in Turkey when there was privatization of it. At the time, Karpowership was the first company to have an export licence and began exporting electricity from Turkey to Iraq.



“Then, many mining companies in Africa approached us and said ‘can we please build land-based power plants for them’ because they could not get reliable electricity and we told them instead of building land-based power plants in remote locations, we could build them inside ships or on barges much faster and with a better design to have increased efficiency and we can deliver them much faster than land-based power plants,” avers Harezi.



<div class="wp-block-media-text alignwide is-stacked-on-mobile" style="grid-template-columns:36% auto"><figure class="wp-block-media-text__media"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="683" height="1024" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-683x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-49312" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-683x1024.jpg 683w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-768x1152.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-1024x1536.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-1365x2048.jpg 1365w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-300x450.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-600x900.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ZH-2020-New-Fave-1-scaled.jpg 1707w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 683px) 100vw, 683px" /></figure><div class="wp-block-media-text__content">
<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“The long-term vision is to eradicate non-access to electricity. Everyone in the world should have access to electricity; it is a basic human right and we have the technology to deliver it.”</blockquote>
</div></div>



So, the organization began building floating power plants for mining projects in Africa. But before they could sell them to the continent, the Iraqi minister of energy requested an energy power plant for their southern city that had access to the sea. Harezi had just the right floating power ship to send. The next two power ships were subsequently supplied to Lebanon before finally their first supply was delivered to Ghana in 2014.



“The long-term vision is to eradicate non-access to electricity. Everyone in the world should have access to electricity; it is a basic human right and we have the technology to deliver it. As Karpowership, we can deliver baseload utility scale floating power plants to the remotest countries in the world with the highest risk of execution and construction, and we can deliver in less than 30 days. So, there is no excuse for anyone in the world to have no access to electricity and we can do it at a very low cost,” says Harezi.



Africa’s population growth is higher than other regions, hence the demand for electricity surpasses the planned increase of power supply. This means there is always a gap between supply and demand. This is a natural fit for Karpowership. Harezi says it can deliver between 25% to 80% of a country’s total electricity on one ship in less than 30 days. And there are “other advantages too” of this model.



“The regular infrastructure-related challenges of Africa are usually to do with project finance, construction risks, execution risks and the timeline. So, a project is usually promised to be operational in three years where as the project finance only lasts for two years and the actual construction takes another three to five years. So, the project that was promised for three years ends up not being finished for another eight years,” says Harezi.



Such solutions could give Africa a fighting chance in the Covid-19 vaccine race. With the company currently providing most of the national electricity in Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Sierra Leone, Mozambique and Senegal, it seems poised to disrupt the African energy sector in a pandemic era.

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Floating Power: ‘No Excuse To Not Have Electricity’

With her education startup in Dar-es-Salaam, Shama Kheraj is creating young innovators, offering workshops at the intersection of STEM, entrepreneurship, and creativity.



At UpStudio Africa’s bright and roomy space in Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania, you see children huddled together in small energetic groups, working on projects that solve complex problems, or trying to program robots coding their next move. Outside of their classroom curriculum, this is a space where they can explore their passion for today’s technology and tomorrow’s not-yet-born professions.&nbsp;



UpStudio’s founder, Shama Kheraj, is able to relate. Growing up in Tanzania, she noticed that her own early education was didactic. Although she initially set out to do a business degree at the University of Pennsylvania in the United States, she soon realized she was drawn to education and social impact. So after completing her master’s in education policy and management at Harvard and working at an education nonprofit in the US, she returned home to change the status quo.&nbsp;



She quit her senior managerial education consulting post at one of the world’s top firms, Dalberg, earlier this year, to create a space for children to have the flexibility to explore emerging fields.



“When I initially opened and talked to parents about product design, it was hard for them to conceptualize what product design is. Because, from their perspective, there&#8217;s not a lot of new products Tanzania is making… we’re often importing rather than building from scratch. So understanding that there is an opportunity within that space has been really difficult,” says Kheraj.&nbsp;



She sees her venture solving a bigger issue at hand on the African continent. Unemployment is on the rise and her work is trying to funnel through as many entrepreneurs and innovators, creating the next generation of jobs. Kheraj believes that the next 20 to 30 years will look radically different in Africa, especially with the growth of the ICT sector. Despite the current focus on the delivery of digital products, she sees more designers, engineers and creators thinking about creative spaces and how to design products for users. 



<div class="wp-block-image is-style-default"><figure class="alignright size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-681x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-48845" width="346" height="520" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-681x1024.jpg 681w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-768x1154.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-1022x1536.jpg 1022w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-1363x2048.jpg 1363w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-300x451.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-600x902.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/LEGO-Creative-Boost-at-UpStudio-Africa-scaled.jpg 1703w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 346px) 100vw, 346px" /><figcaption>LEGO Boost Creative at UpStudio Africa.</figcaption></figure></div>



As a startup, UpStudio receives no external donor funding. It aims to become completely self-sustainable in a market where it can be difficult to sell what can be deemed an ‘extra-curricular’ activity to parents.&nbsp;



On the flip side, unlike most startups like itself, UpStudio offers workshops at the intersection of STEM, entrepreneurship, and creativity. This includes both hard and soft skills like product and industrial design, artificial intelligence, coding, and even photography and film. Workshops are facilitated by Kheraj or guest facilitators who are experts in their fields in Tanzania and abroad. 



“The idea is not only to expose [children] to innovations, but give them the platform to think beyond what is existing today such that they&#8217;re thinking about what might not exist. It might be very conceptual, but can help them imagine a future that they would like,” she says.



Despite being in the works for a few years, UpStudio opened in February and did not anticipate that within a month, would have to move all workshops online when the pandemic hit. At this point, Kheraj was hit with a new curveball when parents were sometimes no longer in a position to afford the workshops, or did not want to overwhelm children who already had to adjust to online learning with more screen time. It’s been a slow but steady start, in her opinion, but multiple children have still stuck through this tough time to stay active and occupied. She is also constantly learning how to better price her services with changing circumstances.&nbsp;



“I&#8217;ve been looking at, every now and then, introducing a new voice within the creative space that might be different from what parents have access to. So maybe, parents already have access to some things in schools today, but not access to someone who teaches photography [for instance],” she adds.



Students can explore whatever topic sparks their interest. “The flexibility that comes with not working within the school system provides is being able to do these dynamic courses focused on different age groups and really be able to not just support one school, but provide support to multiple schools at the same time,” she says.



But she acknowledges how difficult it can be to find people to facilitate workshops. UpStudio relies heavily on bringing in technical expertise and shorter-term partnerships, where Kheraj provides guidance on education pedagogy.



Her passion for working with young children keeps her going through all the hurdles. UpStudio allows them to explore different sectors of knowledge and innovation so that when they&#8217;re going into university, they&#8217;re already aware of all the opportunities. 



“You can&#8217;t be expected to be in one sector or one field for the rest of your life. You will need to create more individuals that can be dynamic… we anticipate that what the world needs is people who are able to kind of move across, but then are also socially responsible,” she says. 



-By Inaara Gangji

Proposed Article Header – Shama Kheraj

Beyond Schooling: ‘We Anticipate That What The World Needs Is People Who Are Able To Kind Of Move Across…’

Tennis champion and Olympic gold medalist Venus Williams has some advice for the more than 30 million small business owners and entrepreneurs across the U.S. struggling to find their footing in the new normal: Don’t let fear take over. It’s a lesson she learned at the age of 19 while competing with sister Serena, then 17, at the 1999 U.S. Open. Williams only made it to the semi-finals—her sister went on to win the tournament.



“I let fear take over, and that&#8217;s where I should have just let go and would have been my best,” she says. “You want more, and you work very hard for more, so less than that is just&nbsp;not&nbsp;acceptable. That was my biggest loss.”&nbsp;



Speaking to&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;ahead of the American Express “<a href="https://about.americanexpress.com/all-news/news-details/2020/American-Express-to-Host-Ninth-Annual-Business-Class-LIVE-Summit-for-Success-for-Small-Businesses/default.aspx" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Business Class Live: Summit for Success</a>” on October 20, Williams drew parallels between her experience playing tennis and running various businesses during the pandemic. “Even though it’s a very challenging time it’s an opportunity to really refine your business and make it something that is a service or a product that is really needed and not just wanted,” says Williams, the founder of full-service commercial and residential design firm V Starr and activewear brand EleVen by Venus Williams. “This year showed all of us that we need to be a product or service that you can’t say no to.”



All entrepreneurs can benefit from that guidance right now. As of August 31, more than 163,000 businesses have closed as a result of the pandemic, according to Yelp’s September&nbsp;<a href="https://www.yelpeconomicaverage.com/business-closures-update-sep-2020" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Local Economic Impact report</a>. This represents a 23% increase from July 10. Even more alarming: 60% of closed businesses have permanently shuttered due to Covid-19 and the resulting restrictions in many states. The&nbsp;<a href="https://www.yelpeconomicaverage.com/yea-q3-2020.html" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Q3 Yelp Economic Average Report</a>&nbsp;released on October 22, however, points to a hopeful rebound: More than 210,000 businesses have now reopened amid a significant increase in consumer interest for outdoor related services and activities.&nbsp;



For those businesses that have managed to stay afloat, the path forward will require the will to adapt in an ever-changing environment. In fact, about 76% of small and medium-sized businesses have had to pivot their business models to maintain revenue, according to the latest Business Resilience Survey of 1,000 business owners by American Express. Of those surveyed, 73% expect to pivot again in the next year. More than 80% still believe the benefits of owning their own businesses outweigh the challenges.&nbsp;



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">“It’s okay to be afraid, but it’s not okay to let it ruin your decision-making process. There’s always a reason to be afraid. But should you let that take over? Hell, no.” </blockquote>



When it comes to overcoming obstacles, small business owners can’t afford to doubt themselves. Williams learned this, and the importance of mental preparation, long ago. “It’s okay to be afraid, but it’s not okay to let it ruin your decision-making process,” she says. “There’s always a reason to be afraid. But should you let that take over?,” she says. “Hell, no.”&nbsp;



The hard-earned lessons from the court have translated to the boardroom as she’s set out to become a multi-venture entrepreneur. Inspired by her father, who ran his own security company, and her mother, who encouraged her creativity as a child, Williams found her second calling in fashion and interior design. In 2002, she founded V Starr, which recently collaborated with Airbnb partner Niido to design its first-ever apartment complex. In 2009, Williams and her sister became the first African American women to buy&nbsp;<a href="https://www.espn.com/nfl/news/story?id=4422313" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">a stake in a NFL franchise</a>&nbsp;when they joined the ownership group of the Miami Dolphins. Three years later, she launched EleVen by Venus Williams and earned her associate degree in fashion design from the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale. Earlier this year, she partnered with Credo Beauty to launch a line of clean, mineral-based SPF products for EleVen by Venus.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Williams says running her businesses in the current environment has been one of the greatest challenges she’s ever faced, but she still appreciates the silver linings. “The world of business is really lending a hand to African Americans and women and minorities during this time. And that has also been unprecedented—so opportunity comes out of this really crazy hardship as well. You have to look at that as a challenge—you need to accept it and run with it. There’s no time to waste.”  



-By Maneet Ahuja,Forbes Staff

Empire State Building Hosts Venus Williams and American Express In Support Of Small Business Saturday

Venus Williams’ Advice For Entrepreneurs: Don’t Let Fear Take Over—Just Push Through It

With the economic crisis and people in her country going hungry, for Ronke Bamisedun, standing by and doing nothing was not an option.



Almost every industry has been adapting to life during the Covid-19 pandemic. While small businesses might not be an industry, they contribute tremendously to millions of people in Africa. With the demand shocks that have been created by the virus, we can see decreased consumer spending, which has consequently led to temporary business closures.



An adverse effect of the pandemic in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous economy, is hunger. The Covid-19 lockdown, which has been implemented in the country since May, is causing thousands of unemployed youth to resort to desperate measures to keep hunger at bay. The situation was so dire that it has caused Latti Ronke Bamisedun, founder BWL Agency, an award-winning strategic communications agency based in Lagos, to take a temporary pivot and focus her efforts where it is needed the most.



“When the lockdown started across the world, all our clients pretty much pressed pause on all our work. This is the first time in almost ten years that I have not worked. You know, I tried to figure out how best to use this time and then I was driving during the lockdown to the supermarket and I drove past a group of youth in Lekki and they had started carrying placards that said ‘please feed us, we are hungry’ – there were about 150 of them on that Admiralty Road and I knew at that point that I had to do something to help.”



Her efforts almost caused a stampede as the hungry youths collected all the donations in a split second. Bamisedun then set up a social media page and started raising more funds to feed the youth. They used a local church in Lekki, a suburb of Lagos, as a distribution center and began feeding the street children in the area. In just over a few months, the food distribution operations have spread to different parts of Lagos.



“We started with 300 meals and as donations increased, we went to about 1,200 meals a day. Once Lekki was sorted, we identified other areas that needed our help. One of the locations was Victoria Island, a commercial hub and with all the businesses closed, there were a lot of people by the park who had been neglected so we started distributing there too. We did about 300 meals daily before we moved to Ikoyi where we also distributed about 150 meals daily,” says Bamisedun.



Since its inception, Bamisedun’s food donation campaign has provided meals to over 40,000 people. The change from the corporate world she is used to has given Bamisedun a deeper sense of connection with Nigeria where she grew up as a young girl before relocating to the United Kingdom (UK) to complete her secondary education. After graduating from Birmingham City University with a BA in Media and Communications, she joined Kaizo PR in London, where she worked on a number of campaigns including House of Marley, a range of eco-friendly audio products by Bob Marley’s family. After relocating to Nigeria, she joined Grayling, an international communications firm where Bamisedun was hired to support the African expansion of the business.



“I was in that role for a year before the company decided that Nigeria was too volatile for them at the time and that was how I started my own agency.”



That was the serendipitous moment that birthed the BWL Agency. The company has since handled brand campaigns for some of the most reputable brands in the country such as Pernod Ricard and Universal Music Group as well as non-governmental organizations like the United Nations Foundation and Bloomberg Philanthropies.



The coronavirus has sometimes been called an equalizer because it affects both rich and poor, but when it comes to food, the commonality ends. It is poor people, including large segments of poorer nations, who are now going hungry and facing the prospect of starvation.



“This project further opened my eyes to the inequality and injustice in the country and as such, we are working out a long-term plan to ensure that these vulnerable communities do not go without. Nobody should go hungry,” avers Bamisedun.



The sudden loss in income for millions of Nigerians who were already living hand-to-mouth along with the collapse in oil prices has made the hunger situation an especially precarious one for the country. Some parts of the country are already experiencing looting and break-ins amid frustrations and worries about hunger. For Bamisedun, standing by and doing nothing is not an option.



“Weirdly enough, this season and this project has given me a sense of belonging and I am determined to do what I can to ensure that this country becomes somewhere we can all call home. I didn’t know that we were going to be doing over 1,500 meals a day across four communities. I just wanted to help. For me, this has been a time to serve others and it really has been a humbling experience,” she says.

Tag: Entrepreneurs

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