The Sunday News
Ngonidzashe Chiutsi Business Correspondent
THERE is a need to capacitate local companies and small to medium traders with skills and knowledge on how to venture into the export market as most of them lack requisite know-how, which is affecting the growth of their businesses, an expert has said. In an interview last week, ZimTrade training facilitator Mr Shadreck Zhou said a number of new companies and small to medium enterprises had little knowledge on how to venture into the export market.
“Most of the companies and small to medium enterprises lack exposure to international trade and there is a need for capacity building so that when they venture into international trade they know what is required,” said Mr Zhou.
He said there were a lot of factors to be considered before venturing into trade.
“Before you venture into the international market you must do a clear and comprehensive analysis of the country differences. As Zimbabwe we have got differences with countries in terms of culture, regulation, competition levels and those differences will guide your strategy,” said Mr Zhou.
He commended ZimTrade for facilitating training for the business community as this was enabling small players to appreciate and understand foreign markets.
This month ZimTrade has held two training sessions on Marketing and Branding for International Competitiveness that were facilitated by various organisations such as Zimbabwe Revenue Authority, The Zimbabwe International Trade Fair company and business consultancies.
ZimTrade’s SME Export and Development manager Mr Allan Majuru said his organisation was targeting upcoming businesses to train them to venture into the export market.
“As you might be aware, there is still brain drain and most of the experienced personnel have left the companies and what we are trying to do is to teach the new guys who are coming into these companies to capacitate them with the necessary skills,” he said.
“We are also targeting SMEs and you see our economy now hinges on SMEs and what we are trying to do is to enable them to penetrate markets. Like for SMEs you have to do the export readiness checker to see whether the products conform to the standards of the intended destinations. So these are the skills and knowledge that we are trying to impart on the SMEs.”
