By Chinyere Anyanwu
As part of the Entrepreneur Support Programme (ESP) launched in December 2020, Nourishing Africa, in partnership with MasterCard Foundation and United States African Development Foundation (USADF), has completed a 12-day virtual training for 1000 young grassroots entrepreneurs.
The seminar with the theme, “Agribusiness Entrepreneur Development”, comprised intensive daily training sessions between March 25 and April 13, 2021, and held across 11 states of the country, providing the participants the opportunity to acquire practical knowledge, skills and insights to enable them to retool, rebuild and strengthen their business models while also withstanding future shocks and driving sustainable growth in the landscape.
Facilitated by 36 industry experts and thought-leaders in the entrepreneurship, business, agriculture and food landscapes in Nigeria and across the globe, the seminar leveraged various teaching methods to engage the participants, including hands-on practical sessions, lectures, class discussions, panel discussion, question and answer sessions, and breakout sessions.
Some of the topics discussed at various sessions of the event include cross-examining the Nigerian food and agriculture landscapes, demand-driven business models, an introduction to value chain analysis, leveraging technology and innovation, maximising branding, marketing and communication, financing your agribusiness, and shaping your ecosystem, among others.
At the seminar, the participants expressed satisfaction on the quality of knowledge gleaned at the various sessions, stressing that they are excited to share key learnings and impacts of the training on their agribusinesses on social media.
Meanwhile, Nourishing Africa has promised to make the curriculum widely available both as an e-learning tool to other African entrepreneurs and modules into the existing academic curriculum to equip youths with the requisite skills and knowledge to build sustainable businesses on the continent.
The training programme is one of the key projects under the MasterCard Foundation COVID-19 Recovery and Resilience Programme that aims to attract, empower, equip, connect and celebrate over one million innovative young entrepreneurs who will drive profitable and sustainable growth of the African agriculture and food landscapes.