Information is critical in effective business operations and in the efficient operation of markets. An ILO project in Uganda empowers the poor to advocate for their own business interests and to expand their business as a result of putting into practice what they learned on the radio. It is one of many success stories in small enterprise development contained in a new ILO report (Note 1) to be discussed at the International Labour Conference.
KAMPALA, Uganda (ILO Online) – “In the days of the internet it is very good that we, the villagers are not left behind”, says one of the seven million listeners to small business radio in Uganda.
Thanks to the ILO’s Small Enterprise Media in Africa (SEMA) project, 75 per cent of radio listeners in the country tune in regularly to small business radio. The shows provide valuable information on business opportunities and markets and give small entrepreneurs a voice.
“The ideas for small businesses make us realise we can try and do something”, says another entrepreneur. Like him, the majority of listeners report that the radio shows are beneficial to their businesses, with one third saying that they have expanded their business as a result of putting into practice what they learned on the radio.
With 65 per cent of listeners of these programmes, the SEMA also reaches the poorest strata of the population. “Radio is by far the most important source of information in Uganda with newspapers reaching only an estimated 5 per cent and TV 6 per cent of households”, explains Karl-Oskar Olming from the ILO’s Small Enterprise Development Programme (SEED).
In 1999, the ILO initiated SEMA as a pilot activity to tap into the country’s growing radio industry and establish a radio programme for small enterprises. The project formed a partnership with the Central Broadcasting Service, a private radio station broadcasting from Uganda’s capital city, Kampala.
The programme was launched as Nekolera Gyange which means “I run my own business” in Luganda – the local language of central Uganda. It quickly became not only an important channel for business information but a platform for business debate and a voice for the small business people. The programme became so popular that Nekolera Gyange became the common local term for micro and small enterprise (MSE), from the streets and markets to the Ugandan national parliament.
The ILO went on to support the growth of other small business radio programmes. In 2001, three similar programmes were established on three rural radio stations. From 2003, with the support of the Swedish International Development Agency, ILO embarked on a broader project to support the growth of radio programmes for small business and to develop the overall market.
Since the start of the Ugandan project, ILO’s work in using the media for small enterprise development has achieved considerable scale reaching millions of the smallest entrepreneurs in some of the poorest countries of the world. Besides the project in Uganda, the ILO has supported the development of commercial radio programmes for small business in Ghana and Zambia, Start and Improve Your Business (SIYB) training on the air in Vietnam and a TV soap opera encouraging migrants in China to sign up for SIYB training (Note 2 ).
ILO activities in Zimbabwe, Uganda and more recently Zambia have also involved developing newspapers focused on small business. “While all these activities involving print media have reached or had relevance to small enterprises, experience suggests that print media gravitates towards larger and formal business. African newspaper publishers believe that their potential primary business audience are larger businesses and research into media consumption supports this view”, says Olming.
Promoting sustainable enterprises
The ILO report to the Conference goes beyond a stocktaking of evolving and contemporary approaches to enterprise development. As a major contribution to the global debate on the role of the private sector in overall social and economic development, it also includes an assessment of the relevance of recent trends for the implementation of the ILO’s Decent Work Agenda and contains recommendations for ILO work to promote decent work through sustainable enterprise development.
According to the ILO report to the Conference, MSEs account, in virtually all countries, for by far the largest share of economic activity and employment. In Europe, 91 per cent of enterprises are classified as micro businesses, employing between one and nine people and only one per cent are large enterprises, with more than 250 employees.
“But it is not just a question of overall size. The justification for supporting MSE also rests with their dynamism, potential to innovate, competitive capacity and overall role in fostering economic progress and poverty reduction”, says Michel Henriques, Director of the ILO’s Job Creation and Enterprise Development Department.
“The ILO has been among the organisations that have been at the forefront of emerging good-practice in small enterprise development. We have adopted a market development approach, particularly for enterprises in the informal economy that are often the majority in developing countries”, he adds.
Note 1 - The promotion of sustainable enterprises, Report VI, International Labour Conference, 96th Session, International Labour Office, Geneva, 2007.
/public/english/standards/relm/ilc/ilc96/pdf/rep-vi.pdf
- Note 2 -See ILO feature story «My Future Is Not a Dream»: Chinese migrants start their own business.