27 Apr 2022

 There is need for Africa to join forces with the world to diversify its revenue streams and ensure progressive and more sustainable businesses.
In a series of interviews on Tuesday in Gaborone, Forbes Under 30  Africa summit  delegates said time was right for  Africa to host the summit.
The delegates also expressed their heartfelt gratitude for being among the chosen elite to grace the auspicious occasion, but combined the accolades with a call for the urgency to uphold business ties.
The Founder and chief executive officer of New Elementary - a Namibian NGO whose focus is to improve the quality of early childhood education in impoverished communities, Ms Helena Kandjumbwa stressed the need for using such platforms to expand businesses beyond the country’s borders. She said Botswana could be a target market for their services.
Ms Kandjumbwa said they identified existing early childhood development centres that were registered and had been running for a while, but were in poor conditions that endangered the life of children, then they would raise funds to reconstruct the schools and transform them into a safe environment for children to learn.
“Thereafter, we address the knowledge capital because it is one thing to have a beautiful building, but what are the children learning? So what we do is to align the curriculum with the national standards,” she said.
She said they exposed children to different areas of learning such as programming, coding, chess, etc, to erase the misconception that poor children were academically incapable.
Ms Kandjumbwa said they also worked towards addressing a crisis of under qualified early childhood development practitioners, by partnering with tertiary institutions to allow the teachers to enroll with them and get a qualification at subsidised costs by the two entities.
The Founder and CEO of CyBourn, Mr Ioan Istrate from the United States of America, said he was honoured to be part of the Forbes family and was excited to be in Botswana, adding that  it was a very good idea for them to organise the summit here rather than in America or anywhere else.
Mr Istrate said his background lies in robotics and he started his own business that deals with cyber security in 2018 and his clients were governments and banks across Europe and USA, among others.
He said later on, he ventured into a project with the UK government which focused on cleaning technologies for de-carbonization and achieving low carbon projects.
Mr Istrate said this opportunity would enable them to network and build connections going forward and was looking for investment prospects locally. “I love it here, and I had the chance to mingle with the UN delegation. The people here are very welcoming and nice. I look forward to visiting northern Botswana at the end of the week,” he said.
One half of the house music band from Botswana, Team Distance, drummer and producer, Mr Roy Kasale shared also expressed similar sentiments about the ongoing Forbes Under 30 summit being hosted for the first time in Africa.  
They said they were invited to perform at the Experience Botswana concert, which was not only a privilege, but a great opportunity.
Mr Kasale said performing on the Forbes platform would certainly expose them to the world, citing that moment meant growth, possibilities for international collaborations and bookings.
Moreover, he said the stage added weight to their résumés as artists, saying the music, which they exported, was meant for platforms like the Forbes stage, and they would certainly consider targeting international ceremonies to take Botswana to the world.  ENDS