Update Required
To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.
23:23..Episode 2: Stepping Into Risk
What If We Get It Right?
Lyrics
Transcript Episode 2TESSA WERNINK
[00:00:20]
View moreThis is episode two of What If We Get It Right in which we are exploring how for-profit and socially aware businesses in the Eastern Congo are strengthening their local economy. We'll hear again from Patrick Byamungu and Mike Beeston from the Bukavu based accelerator La difference, and from local entrepreneurs from Goma, Idjwi Island and Bukavu who work in areas as diverse as coffee farming, clean energy and women empowerment.
But first, for those of you who are entrepreneurs, you might know what it takes to begin a business. But for those of you who aren't, it is both daunting and simple. It is about taking that first step.
But where do you start? Mike, who has a history of entrepreneurship talks to me about how he sees it, and whether there are any additional challenges for entrepreneurs in the Congo.
MIKE BEESTON
[00:01:011]
Every entrepreneur knows that edgy feeling and has an, in a way, an attraction to it, and to step into risk. I mean, you don't just do it blindly without thinking about it, you plan and manage it, but nevertheless you step, you go forward, right?
That's what an entrepreneur does. They see a gap, they've kind of got an idea of what's on the other side of the gap, and they take that step.
You’re definitely carrying something as an entrepreneur. You're definitely carrying, um, family, community weight. But your drive is very conscious of that. But of course it has to be focused on what you're doing, why you are doing it and how to make that grow and make it sustainable. Of course, you have to put your, your heart and soul into that, but you are conscious of this, this community context more so than we are here.
You're conscious of that, but you can't get kind of dragged down too much, because it can drag you down and it can stop you. So you must, you know, you must really drive beyond it to a certain extent.
Many people are already aware that, you know, the catalyst is already in them. And I think that, in a way, the trigger to be able to do something about it is, you know, maybe a particular person that they've met or, an experience that they've had, like with Washikala.
In a way they've... it's been an aggregation of thing which has happened and allowed them in a way to step out of their, out of the general problem of Congo, which is suppression. Circumstances suppress people. But this kind of aggregation of their internal drive. Meeting or having a connection with something; an education and opportunity. They all collide together and they step into it. They intuitively say, I've got an opportunity now and I'll step forward and do something about it.
But all of them will have had that experience. But internally it was already there. Just as it is in many, many, many people, but in Congo, the opportunity is rarely there. And that's probably the catalyst.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:03:09]
Armant Chako, who is a journalist as well as a project director for La Difference, set out to interview some of the entrepreneurs they support.
Under her arm, a list of questions that we'd discussed. Her first stop was Douce Namwezi. Is it true for Douce that she just stepped into risk? What motivated her to get into business?
DOUCE NAMWEZI
[00:03:33]
For almost 10 years, more than 10 years, I've been a journalist actively going to the fields, meeting women, talking with girls.
And there was this question around sexual and reproductive health, that was not really talked loudly, if can say this. And I was listening to women who got pregnant without knowing, to girls who went back to home only because she got, she had her period.
And, I was asking myself, what can we do to resolve this, this kind of situation?
As a journalist, I could only give my microphone, I could only give voice to the problem, but I couldn’t act in any other way.
So, with other friends we reflected on how setting up an organization that could bring another solution.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:04:41]
Douce is a female entrepreneur who has set up a business called U wezo Africa. In their factory, they make feminine hygiene pads. And when they are not making them, her team is raising awareness about menstruation and feminine hygiene.
They work online and in the community, showing how to support girls and women, by on the one hand, breaking through the taboo and on the other, literally making pads available.
DOUCE NAMWEZI
[00:05:06]
As women, there is this natural event called menstruation that needs a good way of being lived with, if I can say this. Because during months, years and years, women and girls are not aware of how they can live freely, they can go to school, they can go to work - even when they are in their menstruation.
And there is this taboo around menstruation that makes a lot of girls lose school, first of all. And when they lose school, there is no teacher who can come back and say, I can do an exam or I can give you a test again.
And once she loses school, just because she is in her menstruation, this is not normal. Because afterwards other pupils will continue studying and she will not. Also, there are lots of consequences of not having a good menstruation education. There are a lot of girls who get pregnant only because they were not aware that they can now become pregnant.
And also there is no education among boys and men around menstruation, and most of them they think that this is dirty, or when a woman is in her menstruation, she can't cook. She can't be in front of you, or she can't be near you.
And, when it's come to participating freely in a decision-making position, for example, in politics and others, if you are a woman who became pregnant, for example, and you are called here a “mother girl”. It's not easy for you because a lot of people will point to you and will say: “She's not a good wife. She's not a good woman.” Only because she got pregnant. And when you reflect on why she got pregnant, it is just because she didn't receive education around menstruation.
So these kinds of needs, they are really important to be taken into consideration, because they influence the way women will be living in the coming years, and in the coming days.
There are these kinds of problems, these kinds of needs that are really important to be reflected on, so they can influence the future of these women. They can influence the position of these women in the future, in the community.
MIKE BEESTON
[00:08:02]
Douce is working in a civil society organization. Her business is not quite so commercial, it has got definite commercial aspects to it.
So for example, she has been manufacturing sanitary pads because of course sanitation, and these kinds of issues for the girls in Congo is a big issue. And she's been trying to find answers to that. And those answers have to be commercially sustainable in the long run.
But she has a wider spectrum of interest because she's been involved in journalism and women's issues for many, many years.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:08:33]
Okay. A pop fact: The world bank issues an ease of doing business report each year in which they rank countries according to their own metrics of what creates a nurturing business environment.
The DRC ranks number 183 out of a total of 190 countries. Things like dealing with construction, permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credits, paying taxes, trading across borders are all measured. And for each of these, the DRC ranks very low: somewhere between 144 and 187.
There was one such metric in which it ranked pretty high. Which was the ease of starting a business, coming in at number 54.
Reasons why this is easy or has become easier, is that the government has started simplifying procedures: creating a one-stop shop, reducing capital requirement… and from 2019 onward, the DRC no longer makes it mandatory for female entrepreneurs to get their husbands approval, to set up a business.
So what is the current position of women in the Congo?
PATRICK BYAMUNGU
[00:09:48]
More and more women are being considered in the whole of the society, because actually we can see them everywhere in political aspects, some of women now can be members of parliament.
Some of them, they are ministers. They are accessing on the ministry and also a big part of different political platforms. In our case, in the entrepreneur sector we work with a woman who decided to start a micro-hydro project. For us it was a surprise to see a woman, who is really determined and who wants to do a hydro project. So we support her and she succeeded.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:10:40]
When I asked Patrick what it's like at home, whether men help in the household, this was his honest answer:
PATRICK BYAMUNGU
[00:10:46]
Yeah, yeah, not yet, (giggles) To be honest, the society itself, they are not on this step right now, but it is something which are going to come soon.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:11:01]
So, Douce, as a female entrepreneur, is breaking through some glass ceilings. A lot of her challenges are institutional, and not dissimilar to many places in the world. Douce has some good examples on how to overcome cultural and social barriers.
But first, we're going to hear from Washikala MALANGO, a social entrepreneur in Goma.
As the co-founder of the solar tech business Altech. Washikala has managed to establish a social enterprise that has 60 outlets, an access network of a thousand of sales agents, and 200 full-time equivalent employees. It distributes a range of solar-powered household products.
Altech company headquarters is based in Goma where Armant went to visit, taking a six-hour boat from Bukavu.
WASHIKALA MALANGO
[00:11:50]
Uh, as you know, I was born in Eastern Congo. And in the 1990s I had to flee to Tanzania for safety because of the civil wars that were going on in the country. And so I lived in a camp in Western Tanzania for about a decade.
And during my stay in that camp, which was called the Nyarugusu refugee camp [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyarugusu], I got this scholarship that took me to the university of Dar Es Salaam. And after that, after my studies at the university for Dar Es Salaam, I decided with Iongwa (*co-founder) to come back to the DRC. And when we, when I arrived here, I worked a little bit with the UNHCR on some integration projects.
And then after that, I decided to found Altech group with Iongwa.
Iongwa and I were both born in Eastern Congo. And we also fled to Tanzania, at the same time for safety during the Civil wars in the 1990s. And we went to the same refugee camp. And then we even also got the scholarship I talked about.
So during our studies at the University of Dar Es Salaam, we started discussing about energy poverty in the DRC, because we took a course on energy and the environment. And so, we decided to go back to the DRC and to start the company in this field. We decided to just return to Eastern Congo,and then we started Altech group and, you know, piloting the distribution of a few thousand solar lamps.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:13:37]
Energy poverty means a lack of access to energy, or as lacking access to an affordable, sustainable energy service. So what's the situation in the DRC?
Over a decade ago in 2009, only 11% of the DRCs total population had access to electricity. 10 years later in 2019, it was 19%. So though the access rates are improving overall, they are still very low. Especially in rural areas, where about only 4% have access to electricity.
The DRCs potential to generate energy is high. Having a wide range of both renewable and non-renewable sources from hydro-power, biomass, solar, wind and geothermal, as well as fossil fuels, oil and natural gas. Approximately 9% of the country's generated domestic power comes from hydropower, specifically from two dams. The INGA dams.
During Mobutu's presidency from 1965 to 1997. The first large infrastructural project called INGA barrage was built in the Congo river. It was to provide 351 megawatts of electricity, as well as drinking water. INGA II two was completed in 1982, becoming one of the biggest water power dams in the whole of Africa providing almost five times as much electricity.
All of Mobutu's prestige projects had something in common. They were built by foreign companies, incorporated the latest technological features and were delivered as turnkey solutions. And… they never worked properly.
And the hightech would be in the hands of local people who were not trained and who didn't know how to deal with it. Moreover, turbines were built to deliver energy to national projects, with no thought being given to branching the energy out to communities along the way.
There is a lot of interest and goodwill from the international community to solve the problem of energy access and poverty. But what if these solutions started locally with people who understand the circumstances and the complications.
MIKE BEESTON
[00:15:47]
So they obviously understand the kind of daily conditions of life in Congo, and are motivated to do something in their eyes that means helping to give people the opportunity to buy clean energy solutions such as solar lamps, solar systems, in particular. And we're also looking at how digital technology can contribute to that as well.
So they're trying to find affordable ways, ways that in a way, onboard people into the system. Cause, so many solutions in other parts of Africa, there is a level above Congo. Congo is this kind of step, it's not in the same economic circumstance, for example, as its neighbours. So you have to, in a way, kind of rebase your thinking in order to engage or to help people engage with, for example, buying a lamp.
If a solar lamp costs $30, then that's impossible for most people in Congo, they just simply can't. Even if it's $10, they can't. So, you need to find a way to help them start paying for that lamp at less than a dollar and continue paying to the end and make sure that you're, in a way, understanding of their circumstances so that they can actually finish that payment and own that lamp.
Washikala and Iongwa really, really understand that, and because they understand Congolese circumstances and how to address them, they've been able to grow a business from scratch. To the point where this year, it’s budget for this year is over $8 million, which in the Congolese terms is fantastic.
WASHIKALA MALANGO
[00:17:24]
When we started, as I said, we decided to conduct a pilot involving the distribution of a few thousand solar lamps. And the idea when we started there was to sell these – to use a cash sales model. B ut again, when we started, we realized that it was difficult to sell this product upfront, because we were dealing with some of the poorest households in the world.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:17:53]
Alain Ndagano: customer service manager at Altech
ALAIN NDAGANO
[00:17:58]
Though we have agents on the ground who can go to, to follow on the customers who are late, or who are about to get late…
ARMANT CHAKO
[00:18:05]
…Where they're living..
Alain NDAGANO
[00:18:07]
where they are living, but also, we have here in our office, we have our agents who call again and again, and again, to remind them about it.
And also, as I said, we also receive calls. Whenever a customer, for example can say: “Yesterday, my agent didn't come and I slept in completely darkness. Please tell him to come.”
So, they will receive the call. And also if the customer has a problem with their solar home system, they call, receive the call and then we give it to our technicians, the logistics department, so that they can follow up and make sure the customer is well served.
WASHIKALA MALANGO
[00:18:50]
So, yeah, a few weeks in, we decided to change our model. Instead of continuing to sell upfront to households. We decided to adopt a credit model where we, you know, we started to sell this product solar lamps on credit.
But again, we decided to focus on teachers and health workers. So what we're doing now was to sell - on credit - those products. To sell to teachers and health workers.
And what we realized was that the repayment rate was almost 90%. So, we were very optimistic that this is a model that would work across the DRC, and that's why we decided to start scaling it.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:19:42]
Derek Rugenge: developer at Altech
DEREK RUGENGE
[00:19:46]
Yeah, the processes are simple. At the beginning, we started with a team of agents who are going to the field, meet the clients, talk to them about the app. And then this next process is to help them create an account. Just go to the app: www.sombabian.com
You create an account.
Then you place an order for the product you want. For now we have only one product available: the cook stove. You place an order. Then we have an Orange money and we have an Airtell money, and a Vodacom, an M-Pesa account. So after ordering you pay, you choose to pay by the carrier you want. One of the two operators, you pay. Then after you've paid, we see that the order has come, and you can receive the payment through an SMS. We see someone has paid.
And then in every city where we are, we have pickup points, where you.. Let's say in the area, we have to pick up points. If you purchase a product, you order, you pick your products from there. We make it easy for everyone around, you see, to pick a product from nearby places.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:20:51]
The intrinsic motivation of these entrepreneurs is rooted in the problems they see around them every day.
They know their environment and their customers, which is necessary to build solutions that are rooted in community needs, but they also know they need to be agile and check their assumptions.
WASHIKALA MALANGO
[00:21:07]
You know, when we started, we had to realize that, you know, selling upfront would not work. So we really had to change the model as quickly as possible.
That is, that was very important. It was one of the biggest lessons. Sometimes it is important in any type of business to learn quickly, because when you start the business, you always come up with several assumptions and sometimes when you test those assumptions, you'll find that they will not work. And some people, they keep on working on the same assumption instead of like, you know, realizing maybe these are not the best assumptions. And you should, maybe it's important to adopt a new assumption.
TESSA WERNINK
[00:21:53]
In the next episode, we will hear more from Douce and Washikala about how they have approached their challenges. As well as from Chance Rwezi who runs a coffee cooperative on the island of Idjwi.
CREDITS
22:07
This podcast series is a collaboration between Tessa Wernink and global design agency Impossible. Interviews with the entrepreneurs were organized, conducted, and translated by Armant Chako. Production, scripting and narration by Tessa Wernink. Sound design and editing by James Powell. All music used in this podcast is listed and credited on whatifwegetitright.com. Design an artwork by BeAPeach and Impossible. Special thanks to La Difference for all their help and support in putting this podcast together.
NO NEED TO ADD TO TRANSCRIPT! -
ADVERT:
22:42
If you like this podcast series and are interested in learning more about how today's most urgent issues intersect with climate change, then check out Lily Cole's podcast Who Cares Wins. From technology to food, gender to capitalism, each episode discusses a theme posed as a question. She interviews leading experts, activists and business people, so that we can hear the different points of view that exist and better understand the nuances around some of the world's most pressing issues.
You can find the who cares, wins podcast on any podcasting service or visit Lilycole.com/who-cares-wins
More songs by What If We Get It Right?
Mdundo.com is one of Africa's leading music services! The company aims to provide Africa with easy and legal access to online entertainment and reach millions of people across Africa every month. Mdundo enables artists to keep track of fans, downloads and royalties paid in July and January every year.
By downloading MP3 music from Mdundo.com YOU become part of supporting African artists! You can get the latest music, top mixes and your favorite playlists from top artists across Africa. Mdundo also gives you easy access to the hottest podcast, sports and religious content.
Mdundo is also working with top partners across Africa including Vodacom, MTN, Airtel, Safaricom, Universal Music, Warner Music, Opera and many more to make music accessible for all. Mdundo.com A/S is a publicly listed company and Nasdaq First North Growth Market in Copenhagen, Denmark.
