Small Business Growth Programmes
For over a decade, we have been designing and implementing Enterprise Development programmes that deliver exceptional and long-lasting results. Much of our success is due to our own understanding of the entrepreneurial journey, born of years of starting, growing and running our own businesses across multiple sectors.
This allows us to provide solutions that resonate with entrepreneurs, creating real and sustainable growth for the small businesses with whom we work, and measurable impact for clients and stakeholders. The long-term survival rate (tracked over ten years) of Fetola programme participants is 87.4%, almost five times the national average.
Our tried and tested methodology combines diagnostics, practical skills training, expert mentorship, e-learning, consulting, access to markets and access to finance.
In addition to our core team of 30 project managers, consultants and strategists located in Cape Town, Fetola has a national team of more than 30 expert mentors located in all nine provinces.
They range from generalist mentors to sector specialists in areas such as mining, agriculture, construction and retail. Our whole team share a common trait – the passion to make a lasting impact on the growth of small businesses in SA.
Here are some of our intitiatives:
SABF THOLOANA
Our flagship programme, designed and implemented in partnership with the team at SAB Foundation, is now entering its fourth year and has become one of the most visible and impactful programmes of its kind in SA. To date, over 150 emerging businesses in all nine provinces have attained new levels of success during their time on the programme.
Tholoana is a two-year intervention which offers participants access to skilled mentors, practical workshops and training, market access support, investment readiness, finance, a peer support network and a host of other interventions that lay the foundation for sustainable growth. Developed in close partnership with the team at the SAB Foundation, the programme has a special focus on rural businesses and those led by women and youth. To date it has delivered an average growth rate per business of 47.2% across all intakes – more than ten times the national average in terms of business growth, an exceptional result in a tough economy.
The next call for the SAB Foundation Tholoana Programme is around the corner and we want to make sure you know when it happens. Follow this link and fill your details in and we will notify you when the application is open.
WASTE TO WING
A first in Africa, the Waste to Wing project aims to prove the feasibility of waste-based sustainable jet biofuel production and consumption in South Africa with the aim of replicating elements of the project in other African countries. Answering South Africa’s triple crises – energy, environment and an equitable economy – the project will enable 25 micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises to create a new supply chain to an energy company.
The project will adhere to global sustainability standards chosen by the aviation industry to ensure that biofuel is used in a manner that sustains food security, biodiversity, water, land, and labour rights. The project will reduce greenhouse gasses emitted by the aviation industry, while simultaneously capacitating South African entrepreneurs to adopt sustainable consumption and production practices and seize green economy opportunities.
The project partners are Fetola Foundation, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and SkyNRG, with funding by Switch Africa Green, a programme of the European Union.
ABSA SUPPLIER DEVELOPMENT AWARDS-BIG BUSINESS MAKING A BIG IMPACT
Supplier Development is a crucial component of our growth and transformation agenda as a nation. Done properly, it leads to sustainable growth, genuine empowerment and positive benefits for all stakeholders, but it remains a misunderstood and often confusing exercise.
The inaugural ABSA Supplier Development Awards are designed to shine a light on what is working in this space, celebrate successes and share best practice. An initiative of Business Day, in partnership with Fetola, Cold Press Media, and TISO Events, the Awards will provide high-profile, national exposure and recognition to the finalists, as well as ongoing networking opportunities for businesses wanting to make connections with, and learn from, key stakeholders in Supplier Development.
GROUNDSWELL AFRICA- MAKING GREEN MAINSTREAM
Equipping eco-entrepreneurs with the business support they need to succeed
The GROUNDSWELL business accelerator is well on its way with the recruiting phase done and dusted. We received over 800 applications from all over South Africa and, after a rigorous selection process, shortlisted 40 diverse and innovative entrepreneurs.
These lucky 40 eco-entrepreneurs will get to attend the GROUNDSWELL Personal Transformation and Strategic Planning training workshop in May where we will select the final 30 to embark on an intensive business growth programme over an 18-month period. We look forward to introducing our programme collaborators during the workshop and getting to know our entrepreneurs better.
The GROUNDSWELL programme uses Fetola’s tried-and-tested core business development modules as well as group mentoring, which encourages fruitful peer-to-peer learning opportunities. The programme also offers entrepreneurs plenty of opportunity for discussion with sector experts and avenues to market access
About the programme
GROUNDSWELL, launched with seed-funding from J.P.Morgan, is a tailored business acceleration programme for entrepreneurs who are passionate about bringing critical solutions for today’s environmental challenges. The programme is designed to create collaboration between entrepreneurs, technical agencies, corporates and sources of capital.
To register your interest in collaboration opportunities email our Project Manager Wandisiwe Nondlazi.
#JUSTADDGREEN (JAG)
We are passionate about sustainable business practices, so the chance to implement a programme that had this as a central focus was something we could not pass up.
The #JustAddGreen programme was an 18-month pilot study that supported the development of high potential, growth-motivated SMEs that are active in the Green Economy. The initiative was managed and implemented by Fetola and funded by J.P.Morgan. Businesses that participated included those that employ clean technology (reducing emissions, pollution and improved material efficiency), provide resource efficiency solutions or bring about an environmental benefit.
Based on the success of this initial pilot, a further round of funding secured from J.P.Morgan has seen the launch of the second phase of this exciting programme as GROUNDSWELL.
LEGENDS
The Old Mutual Legends Programme was started in 2007, in response to Old Mutual’s desire to increase their impact on job creation through the empowerment of emerging small businesses. The primary aim of the programme was to support the growth and sustainability of small black-owned businesses and community projects in rural and peri-urban poverty nodes across South Africa.
In addition, the programme provided an opportunity to raise the visibility of Old Mutual’s positive role in poverty relief around South Africa, by sharing these stories within Old Mutual’s internal publications and externally in the broader media.
The Legends initiative was created as a ‘white label’ initiative, designed and implemented by Fetola for Old Mutual. The programme was repeated annually between 2007 and 2013. It grew from its first intake of ten participants in three provinces, to support an intake of seventy-two participants in 2013 across all nine provinces. The programme generated a number of innovations, many of which have now become standard practise in the enterprise development industry.
Ten years after the programme started, almost 90% of participant businesses are still in operation.
ETU
At Fetola we like to do things a bit differently, so when an opportunity arose to work with the Embassy of Finland on their Aid for Trade programme, our first thought was to create something new and fresh. On the agenda was the need to stimulate trade, create market access opportunities and grow local businesses.
The ETU Programme, which ran from 2009 to 2011, was a transformative and innovative accelerated-growth programme for local small-scale manufacturing companies. ETU was funded by the Embassy of Finland and conceptualised and implemented by Fetola.
Eleven niche manufacturing businesses based in the Western Cape were selected for their entrepreneurial drive, quality products, potential to create positive social impact and growth potential.
The ETU Programme offered participants access to a suite of support to help them build more robust and sustainable businesses. In keeping with our desire to innovate and maximise outcomes, we developed a pay-it-forward scheme, as a way of multiplying the programme’s benefits. Participating entrepreneurs were asked to implement socially beneficial projects in their local communities in exchange for their participation.
Source: http://www.fetola.co.za 
Fetola (Owner)
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