The members of the National African Federated Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NAFCOC) hosted the NAFCOC OR Tambo Youth Chamber Business Breakfast, with the aim of empowering youth by giving them more knowledge to grow in their businesses.
The event was held at Garden Court in Mthatha, last week. According to NAFCOC provincial secretary general, Cwayita Zituta, they brought funding institutions to explain how they work, in order for the youth to benefit and grow their businesses.
She said that they supported youth from OR Tambo and other municipalities in growing and developing their businesses.
“NAFCOC is a multisectoral organisation. We have a national footprint in all provinces.
“We have youth members who attended from all the regions of the Eastern Cape and municipalities that have members of NAFCOC (branches),” said Zituta.
She added that they wanted to make sure that their youth had access to funding that would strengthen them. Zituta added that they wanted to monitor how these funding institutions work and know how many of their youth members benefited from them.
“We have road shows that we have planned with Eastern Cape Development Corporation (ECDC) to go to all the municipalities; we have been to Joe Gqabi and Chris Hani.
“We combined Alfred Nzo District Municipality with OR Tambo District Municipality and then we also went to East London, where we combined Buffalo City Metro and Amathole District Municipality.
“The last one will be Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality and Sarah Baartman District Municipality.”
She said they felt that the youth in deep rural areas also needed this information.
She added that these youths also need to be supported because it is not easy for them to reach these funding institutions.
Zituta said that is why they had made these efforts to be visible to them as well.
The director and founder for Khula Sport Development and Events, Melinkqubo Ndabokutya, said that he had learnt a lot from this engagement. He said that it was an opportunity to find better opportunities.
He said that it was very interesting and these opportunities were very scarce.
“Now we know and understand that we must not (only) look at one institution because there are many funding institutions that could help us.
“We should apply our minds because small businesses also create job opportunities for other people,” said Ndabokutya.
