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Johnsias Mutonhori

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Minister of Women Affairs, Community, Small and Medium Enterprises Sithembiso Nyoni has challenged Small to Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to form strategic alliances as a way of upscaling their operations as well as increasing economies of scale.

She said this in Gweru on Wednesday while addressing delegates at a fashion manufacturing factory, Needle Point Pvt Ltd Investments which received 25 modern sewing machines from the government last year.

The factory consists of 25 people where 20 are women and 5 are youthful men, who came together to form a business cooperative.

Minister Nyoni said, it is government thrust to promote formalization of small business so that they can be able to increase production as well as increasing chances to access business other opportunities.

“It is our vision as government that small businesses register and formalize their operation so that they upscale production and increase chances of accessing other business opportunities.

“If you are working as an individual you lose a lot of opportunities and as you can see here, they are catching up with economies of scale which also increases their visibility in the market,” she said.

She added that, government has in place various supporting channel targeting to benefit small to medium businesses.

“We have the community development funds, the women development funds and also funds coming from women’s banks.

“They are all targeted to SMEs and usually they come with training so that we capacitate them with technical skills,” she said.

Minister Nyoni added that she was impressed by the participation of women in the informal sector in Gweru highlighting that it is in line with the president’s mantra that, let’s leave no place and no one behind.

“I am impressed by women who are running their businesses which also contribute to the economy of this country.

“I saw some are in metal fabrication and they are exhibiting profound innovation.

“Some are also running restaurants and this is also part of value addition,” she added.

Mr Obert William, The manager of a fashion factory applauded the government for the support towards SMEs, highlighting that their lives have been transformed for the better.

“We were just operating as individuals and our production capacity was very low.

“Our lives started to change when we decided to come together to form a cooperative and this is how we received government support through state of the art sewing machines.

“Right now we are competing with big companies in the fashion industry and we are projecting that in the near future, we will be able to export clothes to other countries,” he said.

Mrs Tichafara Murenga, an owner of Terry Steel manufacturing and Retail Company which is currently employing 15 people, decried parallel currency rates, raising out that it makes their product costly beyond customers reach.

“Everything is going well in my business. I started about 5 years ago but the only challenge now is about different rates in the streets.

“Most of the raw materials that we use come from out of the country and it needs foreign currency. If you then charge high prices in relation to the cost of raw material and production you will be bound to lose it to big business in the market.