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Oliver Kazunga, Senior Business Reporter

GOVERNMENT and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) have partnered in creating a design for the demo worksite to be set up in Bulawayo to address the challenges faced by traders in the informal sector.

Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Women Affairs, Community, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Mr Melusi Matshiya said this in a speech read on his behalf by Mr Francis Gondo, a director in the same ministry during a workshop to co-create design of workspace for the informal traders in Bulawayo last week. 

“A site has been chosen to develop a demo worksite which provides integrated and comprehensive solutions to the identified challenges faced by the informal economy traders.

“We are co-creating a design for the demo worksite for the informal economy traders which has been proposed to be set up in Bulawayo.

“The idea of having a demo worksite is such that all key stakeholders can learn and adapt this concept in their respective towns and cities,” he said.

On behalf of the Government, Mr Matshiya commended ILO for providing technical and financial assistance for the intervention saying such a gesture goes a long way in promoting an enabling environment for the development of the SME sector.

He said Government and ILO recently observed that local authorities appear to be collecting levies from the informal sector but without much attention to a decent work environment and social protection being accorded to the sites from which the entrepreneurs operate.

During the same forum, players in the informal economy called on authorities to facilitate provision of decent work spaces and ensure social protection as incentives to successful formalisation of the sector.

Representatives of the informal sector highlighted that although Government has approved the SMEs formalisation strategy, reinforcement of the social contract and creation of sustainable decent jobs was slow.

Research indicates that about US$5,7 billion could be circulating in the informal market. 

The drive to ensure SMEs and players in the informal sector formalise was born out of the need by Government to tap into the informal economy. 

Last year, the number of businesses in the SMEs sector that formalised their operations increased to 18 500 from 13 000 in 2017. — @okazunga