02 Aug 2022

Informal sector entrepreneurs have been urged to exploit all opportunities presented to them to grow their businesses.

United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) technical advisor from Informal Sector Unit, Ms Kefhilwe Mokotedi revealed in an interview that the informal sector was growing fast and yet faced a lot of challenges, which compromised their growth, citing the COVID-19 pandemic.

The sector, she said, had shown a significant growth as the impact of COVID-19 resulted in some businesses closing, employees losing jobs and eventually joining the informal sector.

She urged entrepreneurs to formalise their businesses. Ms Mokotedi acknowledged that some businesses started small but had realised substantial growth hence the need to formalise businesses.

She also noted that during the recent policy dialogue to discuss the increasing importance of the informal sector in Africa held in Victoria Falls, some Small, Medium Micro Enterprises (SMME) business owners decried lack of recognition and emphasised the need to register their businesses to gain recognition.

She appreciated that some SMMEs from Botswana had the opportunity to attend the conference, which brought together experts, government officials, representative of the African Union Commission, development agencies civil societies among others to understand policy gaps in Africa and strategise on effective policy responses and solutions to facilitate inclusive, resilient, sustainable and prosperous recovery.

Entrepreneurs were also advised to take advantage of initiatives such as Market Intelligence Information System (MIIS) and the premier portal for doing business in the country.

MIIS is an open platform that empowers individuals, small and medium entrepreneurs, women and youth enterprises to find information about investment and business in the country.

The platform also assists in diversifying the economy by providing domestic and international markets in terms of how to access and grow those markets for local businesses especially SMMEs.

Ms Mokotedi said UNDP was committed to supporting the informal sector to ensure its inclusion as an important contributor in the economy. 

The sector, she said was the largest employer with over 190 000 workers as per the 2020 survey.

She said the sector needed greater protection hence UNDP efforts to develop and implement the national Informal Sector Recovery Plan.

The plan seeks to provide mechanism for the informal sector businesses to respond to the effects of COVID-19 pandemic and currently being implemented in five areas of Maun, Palapye, Kasane Molepolole and Oodi in collaboration with associations such as Women in Business Association (WIBA) and Thusang Basadi among others.

The plan was developed after analysing the impact of the pandemic as the sector was left out while the government introduced some initiatives to cushion businesses.

Ms Mokotedi is hopeful that the plan would support the sector to blossom as they had identified areas under which they would assist.

“At UNDP our mandate is to eradicate poverty, ensure sustainable development as well as inclusiveness of institutions and we cannot talk inclusiveness while a certain group is left out hence our support towards the informal sector,” she said. ends