Nov. 2 - Finally, the answer to the question, “What’s Rick been doing in Swaziland?”
Some of you have asked, “Why does the blog detail Wendy’s activities, and we don’t hear anything about Rick?” There are three reasons for this: 1) Wendy writes the blog; 2) Rick has said “I leave the blog to you”; and 3) Wendy can point to more tangibly successful activities than Rick can.
Rick’s role is to work with the team of business advisors who attempt to start or grow businesses that will provide jobs for the poor, particularly in rural areas. This is an important activity in Swaziland, since the unemployment rate is generally conceded to be well above the official rate of 40%. Starting businesses is also a challenging activity, as any Silicon Valley entrepreneur can attest. Now imagine that you are trying to start a business without benefit of a venture capital community or lots of successful role models. Also take into consideration that if these businesses are successful that they will have reasonable, but not spectacular, profitability and return on investment. Add in a generally lower level of business sophistication, and you’ll begin to understand the challenge.
At TechnoServe in general, the approach is to identify businesses, basically sub-industries, usually agricultural, that present an opportunity for profitable operation and job creation. The next steps are to generate a viable business plan for an individual or co-op business in this sub-industry, identify an entrepreneur who can lead this business, find the necessary financing, and provide consulting for the startup venture. This general approach has been very successful in the cashew industry in Mozambique, the dairy industry in Kenya and the coffee industry in Tanzania, among others.
In Swaziland, TechnoServe has a slightly different source of funding and a slightly different charter so we have a two-pronged approach. We pursue the standard TechnoServe approach and we also respond to requests for assistance, if they fit our criteria of potentially providing jobs for the rural poor. Rick has spent a lot of time working with three major clients. The first was a gentleman who wanted to start a bottled water company in Swaziland. Some people think that just because Swaziland imports a lot of a particular commodity that this is a great opportunity to start a Swazi business for that product. We couldn’t just tell this sweet, older gentleman that starting a bottled water company when there were already ten in the market, including Coke and Nestle, was not a great idea. We had to do some research to back up what we intuitively knew was correct. After a few weeks, though, we did break the bad news to him as anticipated.
The second client is a business for pressure treating wooden poles for use as electrical/telephone poles, fence posts, etc. From my financial analysis, this business looks like a great profit generator. However, the entrepreneurs promoting this business have run out of money twice trying to get it started, and now it looks like they need nearly a million dollars of capital to assure a successful start up. They have also been at this effort for six years. The business plan that I’ve developed and the financial analysis that I’ve done give the opportunity credibility, but we still have to find an investor willing to put in almost a million dollars. There are a couple of sources on the horizon, but nothing has been concluded.
The third client is a recent start up that makes traditional Swazi corn bread that must be made from fresh corn. The business started in March and was growing sales to near profitability when the supplies of fresh corn (known as maize or mealies) ran out. It turns out that fresh corn is only readily available four months of the year in Swaziland. The rest of the year, it is either not available or very high in price when it can only be grown on irrigated land in the warmer climate of the lowveldt. This business also can be profitable, but it has already gone through $70,000 of loans and need $60,000 more. We’re putting together a new business plan, then we’ll go with them back to the bank.
I’ve also contributed to a lot of discussions on the potential for a Swazi pork industry and the very limited potential for a dairy industry (which can only be successful with some very good market segmentation and branding). I’ve coached several people on financial analysis, made a presentation on strategic marketing and done some general management coaching. I also will facilitate a strategic planning session for the office. However, at this point, I can’t point to the kind of tangible success milestones that Wendy has had.
I knew coming into this assignment that it’s very hard to achieve demonstrable success in international development in a short period of time. That’s one reason why I wanted to make our first assignment as long as possible, given our other commitments. Development is hard. It’s like baking a cake, you need to have all of the right ingredients, and then you have to go through the right steps to make it come out right. Sometimes trying to get the last ingredient or going through the right process feels like trying to push a rope. But people who go into this type of development are motivated, optimistic and have to have a strong willingness to persevere. Even if the results aren’t tangible today, I know that there will be future tangible results from my work, and so I keep on pushing. I just don’t have much to write about in the meantime.
Nov. 1 – The 2nd TechnoServe baby since we’ve been in Swaziland
Unexpectedly yesterday, my colleague flew out of the office to take his 8+ months’ pregnant wife to the emergency room. Her water broke about 2 weeks earlier than “scheduled” but as many of us know, babies arrive on their own whim. Both the doctor in Mbabane and their OB in Nelspruit, South Africa recommended that since she had not started labor with contractions, it would be safe to drive the 2+ hours to the “superior” hospital in Nelspruit. As Atiba left the office after picking up his laptop, he looked like a “deer in the headlights.” Despite the terrible thunderstorms, dark roads at night, and a border crossing, and about 24 hours later, Ayla was born. TechnoServe’s 1st 2006 baby, Sean, arrived In October and already the office is predicting marriage!
October 29 – Reviewing Our Busiest Social Week Yet
This past week was filled with the most social activities, the most thunderstorms we’ve had in our 3+ months, and the launch of the first JA classes in Swaziland. We met different people for dinner Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday evenings and lunch Sunday afternoon. We’ve had some amazing thunderstorms sometimes twice a day. Today, Sunday, hail was pea-size at our house and mothball size near our friends’ home. In between the mostly warm and humid weather varied from sunny to cloudy.
SUNDAY
Today, we joined some other TechnoServe friends in a baby shower for Atiba and wife who are 8+ months pregnant.
SATURDAY
Rick and I attended a fundraising dinner and auction with friends at the Malkerns Country Club. This was the 2nd dinner and auction we had attended at the Malkerns Country Club, and got just as lost trying to find it as the 1st time. The daughter is in a competitive swim club (1 of 3 in Swaziland) which is trying to build a heated, year-round kids’ training pool so they don’t have to rotate school pools of varying quality. Just that day, their daughter set a Swaziland free style swimming record for her age group. Rick met Dave, a young but retired lawyer, through TechnoServe. Now Dave and wife are having fun doing projects: she runs a chocolate candy-making shop and they are planning to open a few eco-tourism lodges connected by 4x4 roads.
Just that morning, Rick and I with 5 other volunteer trainers from TechnoServe and our Swazi partner NGO, LULOTE, simultaneously taught the 1st JA classes in Swaziland in 3 different locations. About 100 16 – 18 year old students from 9 secondary schools learned how to assess their skills, interests, and values; make informed choices and decisions; and to appreciate the consequences. We are piloting the JA Economic for Success on 3 sequential Saturday mornings to benchmark the capabilities of students from rural and urban, public and parochial schools so our longer JA programs can be more successful. I know that all of the volunteers enjoyed themselves and it seemed as though the kids did too. It was fun to see that teenagers are similar all over the world.
FRIDAY
All of TechnoServe gathered for the graduation ceremony of the top 60 candidates from the Believe Begin Become business plan competition at the most unusual graduation venue we’ve ever attended: a disco club called the House on Fire. Building is a loose term for this series of tin roofs and caverns, nooks, crannies, sculptures and balconies. Various parts were made of wood, rocks, glass, cement, mosaic or a combination, with fire-pits in each “room.” But somehow, House on Fire proved to be a fitting location to celebrate 60 budding entrepreneurs’ completion of 5 intense weeks of workshops. Both the 60 semi-finalists and now 20 finalists will have survived the most rigorous business challenge: creating a bankable business plan, potentially to be funded either by TechnoServe’s prize money or by a local lender. All of these men and women demonstrated admirable perseverance.
THURSDAY
We invited our “downhill” Emafini neighbors Patrick and Katherine Ward to join us to dinner. We went to the Mozambican restaurant, Kanimambo, which is my favorite restaurant in Swaziland. 3 of us had crab curry that was delicious but a great deal of work and mess because we had to crack the claws and bodies of several fresh crabs. I plan to return to ordering Kanimambo’s prawn curry--just as yummy but much less effort to shed the shells. Though Patrick and Katherine are probably 20 years younger, we had a really fun evening out.
WEDNESDAY was our only night at home in 5 consecutive days!
TUESDAY
We were invited to my colleague Atiba and his wife’s home for dinner with another couple whose husband is a client of Rick’s and wife heads the local Chamber of Commerce. It was amazing that they had 5 children, the oldest of whom is 18, and had accomplished so much! Both couples are very well traveled, smart, and articulate. The six of us had a very enjoyable evening with lively discussions ranging from children to politics to religion to HIV/AIDS. These are some of the best memories we are making in Swaziland.
October 22 – Hlane Royal Game Park - the 3rd of 3 Swaziland big game parks that we visited
Today we drove to Hlane Royal Game Park, one of Swaziland’s 3 “big game” parks along with Mkhaya and Mlilwane. We saw a good-sized bull elephant near the road, stopped to take his picture, then as we drove off, realized he was following the car at a rather good clip. Fortunately he veered off into the bush, but that got our hearts racing since he could have caught up with us in a hurry on that dirt road.
The only down-side to Hlane is that their having lions means that the game is sectioned off so that the park felt as though we were in a larger version of the San Diego Wild Animal Park. During the 2+ hour game drive, we saw the only cheetah we’ve seen since we’ve been in Africa in 2006, and the closest we’ve ever been to one period. We stopped less than 50 feet away from a pride of lions (1 of 3 in the park) with a large, black-mane male, several females, and 2 cubs. While we watched, 1 impala approached the water hole looking suspiciously at the lions. He almost persuaded 2 more impala friends to join him, but even though the lions were just looking their way, the impalas’ preservation instinct prevailed and they leapt away. And of course we saw a couple of my beloved warthogs. All in all, a worthwhile trip.
October 21 – Monkey Business
Ever since a Vervet monkey sat on the window sill of our house in July, I’ve been hoping to see and take pictures of these monkeys near our house. As we got out of our car at our house and walked toward our front door, the nearby mulberry tree started shaking. Out popped about 10 Vervet monkeys, one by one, stopping to look at us, then scampering toward the forest on the other side of the fence. I don’t know why these monkeys make me happy, but they do!
October 20 – Swaziland’s Golden Lion Film Festival – the only short-film festival in the world
A couple of TechnoServe colleagues told us about the Swaziland Golden Lion Film Festival of Short Films—the only one of its kind in the world. A friend gave us his tickets because he had a conflict. So Friday night, we drove around Mbabane and eventually found the art gallery cum outdoor restaurant where we sat in plastic chairs facing a movie screen painted on the side of the building. We could have been on the set of the Italian movie, Il Paradiso, where the local citizens watched films in the town square. The festival director and our host, introduced about 7 short films and documentaries, including one he created. These 3 to 30 minute stories originated in China, Cuba, Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, and Swaziland. The Italian Under the Leaves had won the best of the festival the previous evening. During intermission, the festival director introduced himself to us, and we chatted for a while about California, being in the film industry, and the fact that he had married a Swazi woman and now “happily” lived here. It is his short film--made in Swaziland for virtually no money with 2 local boys--was the one that still haunts me. It was a good thing he warned everyone that it was shocking. Too bad the audience consisted of 10 people, because the movies were quite good.
October 14 - 15 – (M)babane to Blyde to Barberton to Boondocks to Bulembu and Back Again
These alliteratively named places are each lovely and intriguing. On Saturday, October 14th, Rick drove us on a long but beautiful trip through Blyde River Canyon, a national park in South Africa. We’re from California, so we were undaunted by what looks like a few hours of driving up and back. Four hours became almost ten with two-lane roads that are only dirt in places. We stopped frequently to sightsee till almost 4:00 p.m. As you can see on our website, Blyde River Canyon is stunning, with river views and rock formations that combine elements of Sedona (bright red rock), the Grand Canyon (huge, open, and rocky with beautiful river), Zion (narrow, carved, red) and Bryce Canyons (unique rock formations), AZ.. The narrow, red Zion-like canyon in one section looks as though some giant miners drilled down then just left the holes behind. One of the most if not the most unique is The 3 Rondevaals, thought to represent the traditional round huts in a typical local village. At our last full stop along Blyde River we walked to Mac Mac Falls, two adjacent falls tumbling 70 feet to the rest of the river below. It was supposedly named for the many Scotsman who had lived in the area.
We had booked a room at the Boondocks Bed & Breakfast, recommended by a colleague. It was past Nelspruit, the biggest South African city near Swaziland, and literally in the boondocks, about 100 km from the far end of Blyde River Canyon. Rick drove like crazy and at dusk we reached the gate where our host put us and our luggage into the back of his 4x4. Through their 1,100 hectares property, over a 4 km deeply pot-holed, dirt road, we arrived at this beautiful compound. It was a spiritual retreat, complete with a huge labyrinth for meditation. The owners had had quite a varied life until they bought the Boondocks. They had traveled multiple times to Africa and came to visit friends who wanted to buy this property, but really couldn’t afford it so our hosts bought it instead. They served a lovely dinner then tucked us into our very peaceful room for the night. After breakfast in the morning, we walked around the area, including the labyrinth they designed and laid out themselves.
Then we headed back on the road toward Barberton, a cute town near the Bulembu border of Swaziland. This is where, along with Nelspruit, some of the delightful novel The Power of One by Bruce Courtnay, supposedly occurred. We had heard that the road between Barberton and Bulembu went through amazing country but required 4-wheel drive over a bad dirt road. Heartened by the prior weekend’s trip over a similar road up to Bulembu, we figured we’d try it. This remote canyon’s spectacular views rivaled parts of Blyde River Canyon! The road was survivable—we’re in a rental car—and after driving through Bulembu, described in a previous blog, we crossed the border into Swaziland and were home in Mbabane a few hours later. Back Again…
