The Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber\u2019s Entrepreneurship Desk has shown significant growth since its inception just over two years ago, reaching the milestone of 300 Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises registered with it. \u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis growth reflects the Desk’s effectiveness in fostering entrepreneurship development and supporting local MSMEs, playing a pivotal role in driving the sustainability of these businesses which ultimately will help stimulate economic activity and job creation in the Bay,\u201d says Denise van Huyssteen, Chamber\u2019s chief executive officer. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt is pleasing to note that the Desk is now supporting 300 businesses, of which 54% are female owned and almost 70% black owned, and collectively employ over 2000 employees. This diversity underscores the Chamber\u2019s commitment of continuing to drive sustainable, inclusive economic development.\u201d <\/p>\n
As a catalyst for enabling the sustainability and growth of the entrepreneurship sector in the Metro, the Chamber\u2019s Entrepreneurship Desk, which is supported by its partners Borbet SA, MTN and Standard Bank, acts as a single platform where business support, growth and sustainability initiatives are housed. \u00a0This is achieved through four pillars namely access to funding and professional banking advice, entrepreneurial and business skills development, one on one advisory support, and market access opportunities. <\/p>\n
Van Huyssteen says through these comprehensive mechanisms, the Entrepreneurship Desk has become a key cog in fostering a robust entrepreneurial ecosystem. <\/p>\n
Some of the Desk\u2019s key interventions include the introduction of the Entrepreneurship Desk Accelerator programme that is designed to strengthen sustainable and competitive MSMEs through identification of financial, management, leadership and compliance gaps and risks, business needs analysis, and positions the MSMEs to be funding ready. The Desk further supports MSMEs with branding and marketing collateral critical for expansion of their market reach; assists MSMEs with expert coaching and mentorship, facilitation of funding, business to business linkages and access to market opportunities.<\/p>\n
The Desk has further placed an additional 17 interns with 10 MSMEs registered with it, taking the total number of interns placed in 2024 to 38. Currently, the Desk is in the process of placing an additional 30, taking the 2024 total to 68. This is part of the Chamber\u2019s MSME empowerment strategic priority, while creating job opportunities for unemployed graduates.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are grateful to our anchor partner Standard Bank, alongside Borbet SA, and MTN who enable us to have the aforementioned impact, rallying behind our Entrepreneurship Desk interventions,\u201d she concludes.<\/p>\n
Standard Bank Eastern Cape\u2019s head of enterprise banking Jonty Bouw says the growth is a confirmation that the collaboration between the Chamber and Standard Bank is starting to yield results in the MSME space. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe growth is evidence of the confidence MSMEs have in the work being done by the Chamber to support their businesses. There is certainly value-add in the various initiatives and events being run to assist MSME\u2019s in their entrepreneurial journey.\u00a0This was further confirmed with the successful launch of the Entrepreneurship Accelerator Programme earlier this year and the second iteration of the programme to commence at the end of August 2024. Standard Bank is therefore proud to be part of the growth which ultimately contributes to job creation and instilling confidence in the Bay of Opportunity vision.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Nelson Mandela Bay Business Chamber\u2019s Entrepreneurship Desk has shown significant growth since its inception just over two years ago, reaching the milestone of 300 Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises registered with it. \u00a0 \u201cThis growth reflects the Desk’s effectiveness in fostering entrepreneurship development and supporting local MSMEs, playing a pivotal role in driving the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[540],"tags":[551],"class_list":["post-5864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-business-news","tag-nmbbc","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5864"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5864\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5865,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5864\/revisions\/5865"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mype.co.za\/business\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}