The first 10 enterprises that participated in the Tourism Enterprise Partnership’s (TEP) Tourism Enterprise Incubator have graduated.
The enterprises took part in a six-month programme, hosted by Credit Suisse, where they were given coaching, mentoring, skills development training and access to finance through TEP’s Ikwezi Tourism Facility, which provides financing of up to R5 million (€289 000). The aim of the incubator is to provide support to accelerate the growth of the participating enterprises, while also ensuring their sustainability.
Speaking at the graduation, TEP Board Chairman, Brian Whittaker, emphasised that SMMEs needed information, skills and finance to succeed, which the incubator catered for. He added that TEP planned to develop similar facilities in the other provinces. Salifou Siddo, TEP Chief Executive, said the aim was to develop the incubator in Durban and Cape Town.
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Morongoe Ramphele, Deputy Director General of the Department of Tourism, congratulated the graduates and thanked TEP for its role in supporting SMMEs. “As a department, we recognise and appreciate the invaluable contributions of private sector organisations such as Credit Suisse that continue to support the work of TEP through their ESD [enterprise supplier development] contributions.” Ramphele also called on other corporates to take a cue from Credit Suisse.
Graduate, Mel Tlhapi, CEO of Soweto-based tour operator, Mel Prods, said the programme had helped her gain confidence and knowledge. “As the first group of young entrepreneurs to benefit from the programme, we are now a strong network and we will continue to support each other to grow our individual businesses.”
Siddo said the incubator was key to the agency’s strategy to provide support to its clients, adding that TEP was busy recruiting the next intake of incubates. Siddo also said that TEP would continue to monitor and assist the SMMEs that graduated from the programme.
According to Siddo, to date, TEP has invested over R500 million (€29m) into supporting SMMEs. He said this investment had seen over R7 billion (€405m) generated by the 4 000 SMMEs TEP supports, with over 80 000 jobs created by these SMMEs cumulatively.
