Ten school teams, one from each of the country’s provinces, will on Thursday participate in the fourth annual Africa National Business Case Competition at The Rock Church in Bulawayo.
Sponsored by Emergination Africa, a local non-governmental organization, and its partners, the unique business contest is dedicated to empowering learners and educators to transform their entrepreneurial aspirations into fully-fledged business enterprises.
“We as Emergination Africa are taking a risk of investing in these young entrepreneurs and what we are also doing is helping them start up their businesses,” Emergination Africa country director Farai Mushawasha told the media on Wednesday.
“We are giving them US$5 000 (and) it may be a lot of money if you are looking at them being high school students, but when it comes to setting up a business it is really a small drop, the goal is to prepare them to be investor ready.”
Following a rigorous process that saw close to a hundred ideas entered last year, the most exceptional will now go before a highly qualified panel in a bid to secure US$5 000 seed capital to start their businesses.
According to the Emergination programmes officer Tendai Dzinoreva, the development competition that spans between 6 to 12 months is in alignment with the government's Education 5.0, which aims at producing skilled graduates to solve the country’s problems and employment crisis.
“Africa is suffering from a huge employment deficit so the best way is to be able to really develop learners who are able to think beyond getting employed,” said Dzinoreva, adding:
“A lot of problems that we are facing globally need solutions, the only way to do it is to critically think around turning those solutions into actual businesses and as Emergination Africa we have realized that it works with high school students.”
Since inception in 2020, Emergination Africa has birthed 13 businesses that they mould from ideation stage, mentorship and product supply among other aspects.