Sadc Industrialisation Week, a game changer — SMEs

SMALL and medium enterprises (SMEs) have said the recently held 7th Southern African Development Community (Sadc) Industrialisation Week (SIW) has been a game changer as it has enabled them to showcase their products and services on a larger stage.

SMEs that exhibited under the ZimTrade banner, said they have managed to engage in valuable networking with different countries in the region.

The Sadc Industrialisation Week aims to foster intra-African trade, develop cross-border value chains and identify investment opportunities in the region through public-private partnerships. Posting on its X handle, ZimTrade said the first day of the SIW, SME’s saw multiple visitors admiring their works.

About 20 SMEs from different sectors exhibited under the ZimTrade banner at the SIW. “As an ISO-certified company and one of Zimbabwe’s only Civil Aviation Authority of Zimbabwe licensed drone operators, the 7th SIW has been a game changer in terms of showing the clients our key services, and some of what we are doing in terms of improving agriculture capacity and to standardise some of the operations within the region,” said one of the exhibitors in a video posted on X by ZimTrade.

SIW, which ran under the theme, “Promoting Innovation to Unlock Opportunities for Sustainable Economic Growth and Development Towards an Industrialised Sadc”, opened on July 28 and ended last Friday
A traditional precursor to the Sadc Heads of State and Government Summit, it is a public-private engagement platform aimed at fostering new opportunities for intra-African trade and investment in the Southern Africa region.

The event allowed SMEs to interact with different companies across the region where they gain experience in different things including innovation.

“SIW has been an eye opener in terms of innovation and industrialisation. We have so many opportunities that we have been seeing from Malawi, Zambia, Mozambique, and the interest we have been getting in terms of trading with these countries has been amazing,” said another exhibitor who produces baobab products.

“I’m so grateful to ZimTrade for giving us this opportunity to exhibit our leather products, we are a leather manufacturing and retailing company,” another exhibitor in the leather sector has said.

The event was attended by SMEs from different provinces who exhibited under ZimTrade. “We have been invited by ZimTrade to come and showcase our products here at SIW. We are very happy to share our story, which comes from Rusape and we have managed to share our story with other countries and they managed to purchase our products.”

In his comment on his Facebook account, Africa Voluntary Carbon Credit Market Forum (AVCCMF) executive director, Mr Anglistone Sibanda said the Sadc region is embracing sustainability through innovation, science and technology.

“It’s interesting to see more locally manufactured products. To me green fuel stands out as a model of sustainable clean fuel initiative,” he said.

Under the Second Republic, the Government is committed to the development of the SME sector for the attainment of Vision 2030.

As a result, he said the Government has introduced a raft of measures in an endeavour to create an enabling business environment for SMEs to thrive. Some of the measures include linking them to different markets. — chrocile