Unemployment is Africa’s biggest challenge. According to 2017 World Bank figures, 60% of the continent’s jobless are youth; an alarming figure. According to the same figures, countries such as the Republic of the Congo, Botswana and South Africa experience some of Africa’s highest youth unemployment rates, being above 25%.
But as Africa’s youth refuse to shy away from the real challenges which they face daily, and build the resilience which is so desperately needed on the continent, pockets of excellence across the continent are becoming more commonplace than ever before. The continent is seeing an increasing spirit of entrepreneurship, which is becoming the breeding ground where success breeds success!
Take Thabang Monyepao, a dynamic young entrepreneur who started his own successful toilet roll business Delight Softies, based in South Africa’s Limpopo Province in 2018. The business is 100% black youth-owned, and apart from making toilet rolls and garage rolls, distributes sanitary towels and cleaning materials. The machinery was purchased from Africa’s leading SMME Machinery supplier – Zhauns Business Opportunity Machines.
Seeing a gap in the market for affordable two-ply toilet paper and sanitary products for lower-income South Africans (who often face price and supply issues), and realising that he wanted to be his own boss, he quit his well-paid job manufacturing aeroplane parts and took the plunge into entrepreneurship. Thabang, who embraces social media to market his business, which has grown dramatically, has expanded its range and employs other youths (thereby transferring valuable skills), saw all his hard work validated last year when his premises was visited by South African president Cyril Ramaphosa on Youth Day (16 June).
Small enterprises such as Delight Softies need access to the correct equipment/machinery so they can grow, increase their production and therefore their turnover. Zhauns, Africa’s leading machine supplier, sells machines which can greatly assist Africa with poverty alleviation and rural development. Zhauns sells a range of machines which produce – Toilet rolls, soap, detergents, roof sheets etc.
The Youth of Africa now have the opportunity to empower themselves by purchasing a machine from Zhauns and taking their future in their hands, Africa’s youth can transform to become the continent’s beacon of hope. In Thabang’s own words, “Fortune favours the brave”.
Visit ww.zhauns.co.za for more information and get FREE online Business Training on how to start and run your own successful business via the Zhauns Business Training Academy – FREE to all visitors to www.zhauns.co.za