Learning to run a business with Enterprise Training

Teaching young people how to grow vegetables is one thing...but teaching them how to run a business growing vegetables is another. 

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Help us fund the enterprise training these young people need.

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The Background

Tanzania has a population of just over 54 million people, half of which are under 16. Despite the country's political stability, impressive economic growth and low inflation rates, poverty is still a widespread problem. 

28% of the population live below the National Poverty Line, many of these in rural areas. 800,000 young people a year want to join the workforce, but limited employment opportunities in the private sector have created a large youth labour problem.

A recent report from Human Rights Watch suggests that 40+% of Tanzania's primary school students (aged 14) do not progress to lower secondary education. Instead, they are left to live the life of an unskilled labourer, potentially repeating the lives of their parents.

In Babati, this equates to approximately 500 students a year. Many have seen their parents struggle on their farms and want a different life, but are unable to progress due to a lack of skills and opportunities. These frustrated young people can easily become disenfranchised from their community, and are vulnerable to exploitation.

Our Enterprise Training can give young people the skills and knowledge they need to break the cycle of poverty - giving them, their families and their community a better life for the future.

 

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How we do it

Our 13-week course is designed to develop basic transferable business skills for young people.

We engage Standard 6 (aged 12) primary school students - regardless of gender - in the activities of a real small-scale enterprise at their schools. Each course is intended to create a profit, which is returned to the school as a contribution to the school's maintenance programme.

The programme covers the following topics:

  • What is a business? 
  • Understanding your customer
  • Market research
  • Getting to know your competition
  • Understanding your costs
  • Calculating a selling price
  • Cashflow planning, and profit and loss
  • Route to market for goods
  • Business report writing
  • Presentation skills

 

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Impact

We are amazed at how well students have engaged with our Enterprise Training.

As well as gaining essential business knowledge, they have developed excellent skills for life and learning - such as questioning the decisions they make and reflecting on how they could do things differently. As they progress to Standard 7, they then share this fantastic learning with the students in the year below them - impacting the wider school.

Even better, the head teacher at one school entered their business into a global competition called The School Challenge, run by Teach a Man to Fish. This big step for the school and students allowed them to engage with a world outside of their small rural community -  a hugely beneficial experience.

And at another school, all 48 students are now growing vegetables at home - effectively creating 48 mini-enterprises! 56% of these are managed by girls, helping pave the way towards gender equality.

 

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