The one-year project trains the entrepreneurs most of whom are women who handle cash daily.
TechnoServe has partnered with Moody’s to train 1,000 entrepreneurial shop owners in Kenya on business and financial-management skills to boost their profits.
The one-year project trains the entrepreneurs most of whom are women who handle cash daily.
TechnoServe Regional Program Manager Alice Waweru said the training dubbed ‘Smart Duka’ will also address major challenges such as long periods of closure, limited inventory, stock depletion and ultimately relatively high prices for purchasers and low incomes for the store keepers.
“They (shop owners) hold the potential to improve hundreds of thousands of lives, but with limited business skills they struggle to make profits,” Mrs Waweru said.
“This project will provide targeted support, which will enable the micro retailers to reduce their costs, increase profits and drive economic growth in their communities.”
The shops, popularly known as dukas, are also the main product providers to consumers living in informal parts of Nairobi such as Mathare, Kibera and Korogocho.
The Smart Duka project will include two cohorts — comprising 500 each — and will have an approximately two-month mobilisation phase and a three-month training period.
The programme that also involves Citi Foundation, MasterCard Center for Inclusive Growth, and Elea Foundation, was launched in 2016. It has so far benefitted more than 5,300 shop owners and helped them access over Sh19 million ($190,000) in credit that mostly helps to re-stock their dukas.
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