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Business Reporter
TRADE promotion and development agency, ZimTrade, says its youth export capacity development programme, dubbed Eagles’ Nest, will be an annual calendar event as it seeks to unlock more export potential for the economy.

The initiative enters a second year with improved activities designed to inculcate export culture among youth-led enterprises.

Economic experts view the youth as the dominant active population whose participation in exports has transformative impact towards the attainment of an upper middle-income economy vision by 2030

“The mentorship programme, which is now fixed on the ZimTrade calendar annually, is aimed at nurturing youth-led small to medium enterprises (SMEs) into export ready companies,” said ZimTrade in a latest update shared with Chronicle.

Under the initiative, successful participants will stand a chance to win an export development package that includes market linkages, tailor-made financial packages, facilitation of participation at international trade fairs and mentorship from seasoned captains of the exporting industry.

“Expectations of the programme are that the participants will soon start their export journey under the tutelage of ZimTrade and its partners, which should see an increase in the number of youth-owned businesses contributing to the country’s exports,” said ZimTrade.

“This is one of many capacity building initiatives that ZimTrade offers to equip potential exporters to be ready for the export marketing environment.”

Last year the youth incubation programme attracted hundreds of applicants from across Zimbabwe who were shortlisted to 100 for screening via pitches that they made before a panel of judges who further screened them to 40.

The 40 finalists underwent intense training to capacitate them in preparation for the export market.

This entailed training in basic marketing and branding, finance management, exporting, online and social media management, trade fair participation, packaging and intellectual property rights issues, among others.