UNDP

Nkulumane Wholesale Market Tour

Yesterday the Deputy Mayor, Cllr Mlandu Ncube, Minister of Women Affairs, Community, Small and Medium Enterprises, Dr Sithembiso Nyoni and the Minister of State for Provincial Affairs and Devolution Honourable Judith Ncube held a tour of the ongoing construction of the Nkulumane Vegetable Market. The City of Bulawayo is currently working with United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) – funders, Dan Church Aid , Bulawayo Vendors and Traders Association and the Government of Zimbabwe under the Urban Resilience and Safe Markets Project through the Nkulumane Vegetable Market. This is part of the City of Bulawayo policy to set aside land and workspaces for MSMEs.

Nkulumane Wholesale Market Tour Read More »

Market Aggregation eases traders’ burden

Vendors and informal traders in Bulawayo are pleading for fresh farm and agricultural food produce to be brought to closer their markets to reduce prohibiting transportation costs and create linkages for ease of doing business with farm producers in the Market Aggregation project. Vendors revealed these challenges during the handing over of COVID-19 materials that coincided with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) field visit on 5 November, 2020. Traders have been having challenges accessing fresh farm products, having to travel to distances as far as Binga and Lupane which results in perishable goods like vegetables getting bad. “It has been difficult to travel to rural areas to order dried foodstuffs, transport is expensive and sometimes locating the farm with products may be challenging”, a trader at Entumbane Complex told the Special Edition Vendors Voice. The Zimbabwe Resilience Building Fund (ZRBF) funded Sizimele Consortium has introduced direct linkages between small scale farmers and informal traders in urban areas, to bridge the gap and create a reliable database of suppliers and producers. This envisages to cultivate efficiency in urban markets, bridging information, and structural gaps through the Market Aggregation platform, which influences on strong pre-existing relationships and community networks within targeted communities in Zimbabwe. ZRBF has come to bridge the gap between farm producers and informal traders, facilitating market linkage for small and medium enterprises in rural and urban areas of Matabeleland in Zimbabwe. This will result in energised production, stimulated and systematic food agricultural markets. Market information will easily be available as the project will create a database of suppliers including service availability, prices, products and trends. For producers, markets will be readily available, traders will be secured that good are coming from producers and customers will be satisfied with prices as there will be diversity of goods to choose from and competition amongst traders due to accessibility of goods that will lead to price reduction. Market linkages will therefore be developed resulting to market visibility, direct engagements and business negotiations. Bulking will also be achieved as traders will come together to market and order goods in groups. Market pricing will be reduced as there will be shared costs among traders, on logistics, transport will be easily coordinated through resource and route planning.

Market Aggregation eases traders’ burden Read More »