Speech made by Edward Chileka Banda at Youth Business Empowerment Symposium, Robins Park, Blantyre, 28th January 2017
The Guest of Honour
The Organisers, CYAMA
Fellow Speakers
And the Distinguished Youth Delegates and Leaders
All Protocols Observed!
I am highly honoured to be invited to speak at this important Youth Business Empowerment Symposium held here at Robins Park, Blantyre. I am greatly inspired that this gathering is about two important aspects of our society: *Entrepreneurship and the Youth*. The youth constitute the largest component of Malawi’s population. Statistics indicate that persons below 30 years constitute over 65 percent of the total population. Such a demographic trend simply means any challenges facing Malawi bear a youth face. The youth are the hardest hit by poverty, hunger, diseases, unemployment and marginalization. Despite being in majority and energetic, the youth are the most excluded in decision making processes and often times, they are abused as political agents of violence and intimidation against opponents. The youth remain the untapped resource for national building and development. Yet the youth are a social capital, a demographic dividend that if utilised, we can transform our lives as well as bail Malawi out of poverty.
The conversation about entrepreneurship is to many of us, long overdue. Malawi remains one of the least developed countries in the SADC Region, African Region and in the world. Yet we are one of the countries endowed with numerous natural resources like abundant water, good land, Nice weather patterns and above all its people. As I am speaking, millions are facing biting hunger, we are importing maize which we can produce in surplus and many more contradictions. The 2016 UN development report indicates that Malawi will not graduate from being a least developed country even after 2025. Entrepreneurship, *WHICH IS THE ABILITY TO EXPLOIT AND UTILISE AVALIABLE RESOURCES FOR MORE GAINS*, can largely explain our sad situation in Malawi. Malawi lacks entrepreneurs. Societies that have advanced have taken entrepreneurship seriously. In fact we have foreigners who come to Malawi do business, and become rich in our face. And they become rich because of us. We buy from them, we give them the profits. And they externalise the money at the end of the day. So we are poor not because we do not have resources, but because we have chosen to be consumers not entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs do balance between production and consumption. Unless we start thinking entrepreneurship at all levels, forget about development. The consumption mentality is currently dominant in government, political institutions, offices, families and even among individuals. One key indicator of consuming societies is RAMPANT CORRUPTION for its people think less about production but more on consumption and they always hunt for easy money. You will agree with me that many are joining politics not to push entrepreneurship but to get a chance to consume easily.
SHAPE YOUR JOURNEY TOWARDS GREATNESS
Life has two flash points; birth and death. The period between birth and death is the journey that must be travelled by each one of us. The quality of life and greatness of destination depend on how one shapes his or her journey. The journey towards destiny is not that straight forward. It’s a journey full of needs, problems, desires, ambitions and even conflicts. Among the youth, there are future Presidents of this country, doctors, Chief Executive Officers, Members of Parliament, managing directors, and many more. Therefore, the youth must be equipped now to deliver on upcoming tasks. One such EMPOWERMENT TOOL is Entrepreneurship which will emancipate the youth from begging, liberate youth from abuse and free the youth from modern slavery.
WHAT ENTREPRENEURSHIP SHOULD MEAN THEN?
As young people, we must understand that no-one will empower us. We must empower ourselves. We must strive to be independent and face the future with certainty. Therefore, entrepreneurship must be understood and embraced from critical angles of:
1. Solving personal and societal problems- every challenge we are facing as young people need to be solved. The poverty, Hunger, unemployment and even diseases need relevant solutions which entrepreneurship offers. As young people, we must not just watch problems and challenges, rather we must confront them, find solutions, and explore business opportunities in them. Entrepreneurship shapes our journey to greatness.
2. Investing into the future: Entrepreneurship should not mean about huge profits today but rather should help us PROJECT into future needs and find solutions to the future problems. This requires generating a vision and how to finance it. That’s why entrepreneurship will demand investments into education. It demands the culture of savings and discipline. Entrepreneurship will demand *FIRST THINGS FIRST*. If it’s time for education, don’t open a Shop, go to school. If time for studies, don’t open Whatsapp, read. You must invest into the future. If still young, don’t behave and act as a married person, invest your time and resources wisely. If you want to be successful tomorrow, then succeed today.
3. Entrepreneurship should mean SEARCH change, and change for the better. When you act to solve problems, when you invest into the future, it means you are not satisfied with present situation. It means your journey is in search for prosperity. We must all seek change and as young people we must deliver that change. It must be us the youth to change the narrative of a poor nation to a rich country. For Malawi is poor because we are poor. We must say enough of poverty, enough of corruption, enough of begging, enough of hunger, we must rise and push for a better change. Entrepreneurship should help us see a far. And we must work to have this change today not tomorrow. We must not postpone change.
4. The Collective Vision must top the entrepreneurship agenda. Doing business should not just focus on us making huge profits, or becoming the super rich, NO. Entrepreneurship must mean offering the best services and products on the market. Entrepreneurship must satisfy the needs of others too. That’s why entrepreneurship will demand adherence to quality, joint investments and partnerships. You can do it alone, but you can do it better with friends. If others cannot lend you money, then the youth can collectively raise the capital and build the Youth Business Cooperative and succeed. Be ready to share gains than being selfish.
THINGS TO OVERCOME
While we all agree that entrepreneurship will help us shape our journeys to greatness, we must be mindful that the process is not that smooth. We must be prepared, as young as we are, to overcome the challenges.
1. We must overcome fear of the establishment. While we set the journey towards our destiny, there are many people that will discourage us, some will criticise us, some will despise us, some will intimidate us, yet others will seek to destroy us. We must be aware of these but we must not be stopped . We must not be afraid of competition, we must not be afraid of the billionaires, the powerful politicians, for they are travelling their own journeys and we should not allow them block ours. Exercise your independent minds. Take risks. No one should stop you from attending an event which they don’t like, no-one should not stop you from interacting with anyone they don’t like, break that fear and do what you want. Exercise your free will. The well and already established entrepreneurs or politicians should not manage to inflict terror in your hearts. Resist and move on. These Goliaths can be defeated by the Davids, the Esthers of today.
2. Break the Social and Political barriers: entrepreneurship requires flexibility and tolerance. As young people we must develop an open mind and be blind to tribal divisions, political colours and regional demarcations. Rather we must break these barriers and move as one nation. We must not allow these to destroy our future, our journeys. We should not allow others to draw us boundaries because of their political interests.
MY TRUE STORY
When you see me, you must see Entrepreneurship. I was born in a very poor family, where no-one had ever reached Form Four. Having failed to be selected to a boarding and better secondary school, I proceeded to a self boarding Distant Education Center (DEC) in a remote rural area where conditions were just poor. I, my brother and sister entered Form one at same time and walked a distance of 30 kilometres everyday in search of education. It was tough. After sitting for JCE, we would not continue due to financial challenges. But after two years, I decided to go back to School, another CDSS where I did all the cooking and the learning. Life was tough. During the first attempt I passed but got 5 credits, not good enough to take me any university that time. I went back home as a hero though, you know life in a village. But after a year, I could still sense that my journey was not yet fully shaped. I went back to school to sit for MSCE again and got 14 points and proceeded to Chancellor College where I graduated with Bachelor’s Degree in Education Humanities. I joined Ministry of Education as a Secondary School Teacher for a year but moved on to follow my heart in areas of human rights, governance and youth development. Even a Teaching profession could not limit my journey. Rather I made sure it furthered my vision. Entrepreneurship has helped me to grow to this and exposed me to many forums, both local and international. I have visited USA, Geneva, France, Japan and many African countries.
You can see that entrepreneurship in form of problem solving, investment into the future, and search for change has taken me to this very podium and be able to inspire some of you.
HOW DO WE TAKE OFF?
We cannot keep on just talking and discussing about doing business, rather we must move and do it. There so many business opportunities out there which we need to grab. By the fact that foreign companies and individual traders are flocking to Malawi and are able to expand their businesses, it is a sign that there opportunities out there. Instead of just complaining, we must quickly learn the art of trade, move to deal with business challenges and grow and implement our business ideas. Time is now. As young people and as a nation, we cannot continue to pride ourselves as a market, buyers of foreign goods and services, we must produce and export. We must lobby for a conducive business environment for young entrepreneurs for that’s the only hope for Malawi. We cannot continue buying imported vegetables, potatoes, toothpicks and even more yet we can produce. There are businesses in every sector as long as we are facing challenges as a country. Therefore, I propose the establishment of *YOUTH BUSINESS COOPERATIVE (YBC)* with youth business hubs a cross the country. Youth entrepreneurs must do this and increase their voice in business sector. The cooperative will facilitate business partnerships, market linkages, easy access to business capital and training. With this, we can effectively lobby for business opportunities from the Malawi Government like a 30% share of all the public contracts. We have engineers among ourselves. With this, the youth can easily own their own Youth Bank, Youth Shopping Centre, Youth Market, Youth Mobile Company, Youth General Farms, Youth Private Schools, Youth e.t.c. We must get organised beyond Faith, tribe, region and political party affiliations. Our only basis for working together must be that we are Malawian youth.
WE HAVE CAPACITY AND WE MUST BUILD IT FURTHER OURSELVES. NOONE WILL BUILD IT FOR US.
You can do it, and you should do it.
May God Bless Us All
edwardchilekabanda@gmail.com, 0999110606
