Lydia Nsekera was widowed when she was 36 years old. As a member of Burundian aristo-cracy, she could have turned to her family for financial support, but she chose not to. Instead, Nsekera took over her husband’s car repair company and used her skills as an internal auditor to turn it into a successful business.
At the same time, the Burundian Football Federation (FFB) was drowning in debt. The association had suffered severe financial mismanagement, was sanctioned by FIFA and faced an uncertain future. It only took the FFB a few months to see the improvements Nsekera had made at her garage before it approached her for assistance.
At face value it was an odd match. Nsekera was not a soccer player. She spent her school days playing basketball and competing in high jump, but had become interested in the game though her father and kept an eye on it over the years. Nsekera was savvy, and the FFB decided it could use someone with her acumen to lift it out of crisis.
When she was asked to accept a nomination for president of the federation, Nsekera was hesitant. She did not doubt her own ability but was unsure if she would be given the free rein she needed to turn around the ailing organization. She agreed to stand, provided she would be allowed to overhaul the structures if she was elected. The FFB agreed and Nsekera won the vote ahead of two male candidates.
A decade later, she became the first – and only – woman to sit on FIFA’s decision-making executive committee in its 109-year history, establishing herself as the pioneer for women’s representation in a man’s world.
“It’s massive for women and I hope our federation and other federations can follow the same path,” says Fran Hilton-Smith, the technical director of the South African Football Association (Safa).
“For example, in South Africa, we only have two women on the national executive committee and one of them is seconded from the PSL. It’s just the reality that football is still male-dominated, but like [Nsekera] has shown, to be successful as a woman, you need to be very determined.”
Hilton-Smith calls it “a miracle”, as it was previously unheard of for a woman to occupy such a senior position in a country’s soccer association. Of FIFA’s 209 member associations, Burundi’s is the only one to have a woman at its helm.
“For her to have been given that position was unprecedented,” says Hilton-Smith.
In her first year at the FFB, Nsekera achieved two major feats. She revived the national league, which had been dormant for three seasons, and rekindled the organization’s relationship with FIFA – to the extent that the soccer governing body agreed to pay for a new office complex for the FFB.
During Nsekera’s tenure, the Burundian league grew to three divisions, FIFA has funded another development project in the country and approved a plan for a national training center in the capital, Bujumbura. The country also held its first women’s soccer championship and the under-17 team won the East African regional competition.
The fortunes of Burundi’s national team have not changed as dramatically. They narrowly missed out on qualifying for the 2008 Africa Nations Cup, but rose from 147th to 104th in the rankings. Now they lie at 124th.
Officials at the FFB do not blame Nsekera for the team’s middling fortunes; instead they have praised her for what she has achieved so far.
“She will go as far as she wants, thanks to her work ethic and authority,” says Jeremie Manirakiza, the executive secretary of the FFB.
By her own admission, Nsekera’s success has come through slog. She has told Associated Press her recipe is simple. “I work, I work and I work.”
With that as her mantra, Nsekera has sat on the executive council of both the East and Central African Football associations, and was part of FIFA’s independent governance commission, as well as its radio and television sub-committee. Her role in furthering the cause of women has extended to serving on the African Women’s Football Commission, the Women’s World Cup Commission and the International Olympic Committee’s Women and Sport Commission.
Promoting the women’s agenda will be one of her focal points on the FIFA executive committee, but it cannot be her only one. The 25-person executive committee makes all the rulings that govern the world game. Members meet at least twice a year and among their most important considerations are the dates and places of FIFA tournaments, not to mention the regulations around how the world body is run.
Given Nsekera’s experience in overhauling an organization, her opinions should carry weight.
“She is on the committee and she will definitely be respected,” Hilton-Smith predicts.
Already, Nsekera has faced naysayers, ironically, other women. A FIFA delegate argues Australia’s Maya Dodd, a former international player and lawyer by trade, who was running against Nsekera, would have been a better choice and that Nsekera was pushed through only because there was much “pandering to the African vote.”
The same members claim Nsekera is not strong enough to take on the job because, “all she ever said at a meeting was: ‘Thank you for taking women’s football seriously’, and that she was only on the executive because Sepp Blatter had handpicked her for the job.
The FIFA boss, who has long supported Nsekera, has described her as a “princess of the game”. Whether or not that is because he wants the backing of the African continent in the future is debatable, but what is certain is that even if Nsekera was given an opportunity driven by someone else’s agenda, she is not one to waste a chance. Just ask the FFB.

Lydia knows how to play ball

The last few years have seen an unprecedented number of people rushing to develop mobile apps for iOS and Android. But looking at the installed user base on each platform and information on the payouts made by the different companies, it appears that the vast majority of developers will find themselves with little revenue to show for.
Google, Apple, Microsoft : Rich in users, developers
The consensus around the industry is that Google dominates the mobile market with 900 million users, while Apple follows with 600 million iOS devices purchased, and Microsoft comes in third place with an estimated 12 million Windows Phones sold (the vast majority of those, 81%, being sold by Nokia).
With different forums aimed at attracting developers, each company handles announcing the size of their markets differently.
Apple, at its WorldWide Developer Conference, talked about 1.25 million apps in the app store accounting for 50 billion downloads and $5 billion paid off to developers in the last year. To the company, it is a sign of pride to be able to pay this developer community. Internal data from the app store, gathered from sources close to the company, indicate that the numbers are in line with the actual payments made to developers.
At Google I/O, the largest Android developer conference, Google touted 150,000 developers responsible for over 800,000 apps. While the company does not break out revenue numbers on their apps, recent data in their financial filings seemed to indicate somewhere around $900 million in pay-outs to developers “over the last 12 months” and discussions with external research analysts put the number of downloaded apps from the Google Play store at around 48 billion, close to what Apple has claimed.
Microsoft, meanwhile, has been claiming 160,000 apps in their store from 45,000 developers. In a recent interview, Microsoft officials claimed that the average user downloaded 54 apps, which would put their download count at 650 million to date. While the company does not break out data for its mobile division, looking at the variations in the accounts payable line of their 10-Qs over the last few quarters before and after they introduced their app store shows a variation of up to $100 million since 2011 that could be attributed to the app store.
So taking all that data into account, we can summarize it as follows:
Looking at this, it is clear that Apple is winning the game in terms of total number of apps and money paid to developers. But lost in the shuffle is how much money developers can actually make on those platforms.
Meager dollars per download
Taking the data in front of us, we can get a sense of how many apps the average developer creates and what kind of revenue a developer can expect from those apps, on ave-rage (granted, power laws dictate that a small number of developers will do extremely well while the vast majority will fail, but we’re trying to look at averages here).
Based on this, the average developer on those platforms is pretty busy, developing 3 to 5 apps depending on the platform. Interestingly, Android is the big winner on downloads for a given app but this is largely offset by substantially lower revenue, with the average app download bringing in around 2 cents to its developer; Apple fairs 5 times better, bringing in a dime for every one of the 40,000 potential app downloads a developer could strive for. But the interesting thing is that Microsoft’s platform may be substantially more rewarding for its developers, bringing in $.15 per download (a fact that is offset by download numbers shown to be only 10 percent of what the other platforms can offer).
With the average paid app retailing for $.99, what we see here is the direct impact of free apps on those marketplaces. Android’s substantial lead in offering free apps cuts deeply into the average revenue paid out to developers while the smaller availability of free apps on the Windows platform may work to its advantage.
But what does that mean in terms of actually revenue?
Impact on developers’ wallets
Multiplying the average revenue per app by its average number of downloads, we can get a sense as to what an average developer can expect to make on an app today. Taking the same number and multiplying it by the number of apps an average developer creates, we get a sense of the revenues one can pull from going that way:
What we see here is that while decent amounts of money can be made on an app, a hard-working developer on iOS will be able to get a new car, while Android and Microsoft developers will be forced into the used car market if they plan to take those earnings on the road. At $4,000 in average revenue per app, Apple has a lead but it still begs the question as to how many developers can actually make a living directly from apps on any platform. Direct revenue from the apps themselves may not be able to justify large development teams but other revenue sources (advertising, for example) may help developers increase their take.
Of course, these are average values and many hope to find the next big hit, the one that will be on the higher end of the median. But for every app that goes north of those numbers, the average for the remaining apps drop.
Where are the opportunities?
There is, however, some hope. While Apple has developed a rich market for developers, Google and Microsoft both have opportunities to improve. For Google, the focus should be on improving the numbers by helping developers monetize their apps so they can come more in line with what Apple can offer. Even if they only reached half of what Apple does in terms of revenue per download, they would be able to match the revenue developers make. For Microsoft, the story is all about the number of users. If they were to manage their average revenue per app while growing their user base, they could potentially out-earn all the other platforms.
In all three cases, however, there is much work to be done to increase monetization of free apps. And that may be the next growth opportunity for any developer as it presents an opportunity that is substantially larger than the existing one.
Every app developer hopes to build the next big hit but, as is the case for any hit-driven market, a large group will be left behind with little to show for their efforts. At the end of the day, the model for mobile apps is no different than any other of the past: whether it is gold in the Yukon, websites in the 1990s, or app developers today, larger amounts of revenue will go to those who enable development than to those who are doing the development. Levi Strauss made his fortune selling picks and shovels to gold prospectors; Adobe, Amazon, and Google made theirs enabling web developers; and as the mobile revolution takes hold, some new players will emerge providing tools to create apps and those may be the biggest winners.

How Much do average apps make?

She is a talk show host, TV producer, media personality and entrepreneur. With the success of her talk show Moments with Mo, Mosunmola ‘Mo’ Abudu is often described as Africa’s own ‘Queen of Talk’.
At a glamorous launch of her Ebony Life TV channel in Lagos, Nigeria, in July, Forbes recognized Abudu as the first woman on the continent to own a pan-African TV channel. With Ebony Life, Abudu hopes to change perceptions of Africa, by showcasing the diversity of the continent and celebrating Africans who are making their mark.
“We believe it’s time to present a different Africa, one never seen before,” she explains.
Abudu was born in London to Nigerian parents. She worked for several corporate giants, including Exxon Mobil, before establishing a human resources consultancy, Vic Lawrence and Associates.
With her passion for media, however, it wasn’t long before she launched on her own television program. Abudu lives by the mantra, ‘If you think it, you can do it’. Her program, is the first daily talk show in Africa to be syndicated across the continent. It focuses on a variety of topics from lifestyle and healthcare to politics and culture.
To date, Abudu has hosted many high-profile people and dignitaries, including former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton and former Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo.
“I remember Hillary Clinton saying to me, ‘People like you have to make a difference by creating a different reality of Africa’. Growing up as an African child in the UK, I remember vividly how I always had to defend who I was as an African. Even in later years… asking people about their perception of Africa, I was shocked at the word associations used to describe our continent, ‘famine, safari, Oxfam and HIV’.”
Abudu says Ebony TV was just an idea but the start-up sum of $15 million seemed insurmountable. However, she did not let her fears deter her.
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“The sheer reality is that there are millions of people who have done great things and started out with nothing except the idea. Don’t be afraid to share your ideas, passion, and ideals. And don’t think that anyone is too different or too insignificant to help,” she advises.
It took Abudu four years of planning, presentations and looking for investors to get Ebony TV off the ground. “This was my idea, my passion and I was determined to succeed.”
The media mogul describes Africa as a “brand of opportunities, where you have the freedom to create whatever you want, because you will always find talent and people willing to help you”.
“On a continent growing fast in terms of GDP and a massive middle class, particularly in Nigeria, challenges must be looked at as opportunities. I couldn’t have achieved this anywhere else,” she says.
She hopes her achievements will inspire other women entrepreneurs.
“Women have dreams, but we tend to hold ourselves back and are our own worst enemy at times. We place ourselves last and put our dreams on hold out of fear and the belief that we can’t do it. We also tend to put other women down; it’s unfortunately a global thing. We need to learn to support each other and celebrate our success.”
She may be a high-flyer in the media industry but Abudu is first and foremost a woman. She believes women have a responsibility to maintain balance in their lives.
“I work extremely hard daily but I believe in looking good and nice. I make sure that I find the time to focus on myself, to feel confident and articulate in business,” she says firmly.
Abudu lights up when she mentions her children.
“Without them, I have nothing. Balancing my role as a working mother is not easy, but they are good children, which has allowed me to progress as far as I have.”
After losing her father when she was a young, Abudu says her mother plays an important role in her life.
“My source of inspiration is my mother; she is indeed my biggest motivator and gives me strength. When I don’t believe in myself, she believes in me.”
Abudu is determined to make a difference in people’s lives, especially young people.
“Even though the [Ebony Life] brand is still young, we will have extensions, including apps, perhaps even accessories and African fashion, which will hopefully leave an impact, particularly on the youth in Africa.”
And with her focus and passion, it is easy to believe her when she says, “everything you think you know about Africa is about to change, forever!”.

Mo Abudu Africa’s queen of talk

Every year, mainly middle class students from Africa head off in droves to the United Kingdom and the United States to get a world class education.
But Britain’s Lancaster University and its partner, Trans National Education (TNE) Ghana Limited, are hoping to change this. They are opening a branch of Lancaster University in Ghana this month – the first of its kind in West Africa.
The campus will be developed into a major teaching and research university of international standing and will be a welcome addition to the country’s education system. Although in some regards Ghana is considered to be one of the best education hubs in West Africa, many academics describe pre-tertiary education at government schools as being in crisis.
Some of the reasons given are poor teaching and not enough teachers. Unions estimate that more than 30,000 teachers have abandoned their posts in recent years for greener pastures.
The Accra campus, known as Lancaster University Ghana, hopes to attract between 3,000 and 4,000 students in 10 years’ time.
Organizers say students will pay just 25% of the costs they would pay to study at a university in the UK or US. In today’s sluggish global economy, this saving is likely to be appreciated by parents who fork out large sums of money to ensure their children get a decent education.
“We are very happy. We have done a lot of recruitment… and have had an excellent response from students,” says the human resources manager for TNE Ghana, Martha Amankwah.
The university will be offering its foundation program this year, and students who enroll in this program will continue their undergraduate studies in October 2014.
The owners of TNE Ghana undertook a similar project in Dubai  with Australia’s Murdoch University. They say Ghana, with its growing middle class making it a lucrative sector for private education, was an obvious choice.
“Ghana is very important for us. We chose it because it is politically stable and a growing economy,” explains the project’s director, Raghav Lal. Post-graduate degrees will be offered as weekend programs, so students will be able to work and study simultaneously.
“Lancaster University Ghana will contribute to increasing the pool of internationally educated young people, ready to take their places in developing and growing the Ghanaian and wider African economy. It will join existing institutions of higher education to further enhance Ghana’s reputation as an educational hub for West Africa,” says the university’s vice chancellor, Mark Smith.
A range of undergraduate courses will be on offer, including management, business, international relations, computer science, law, psychology and the university’s world-renowned MBA program.
There will also be a bridging course for students who need additional training in order to be accepted into first-year courses. In the past, some government ministers have accused tertiary institutions of fueling the high level of joblessness among graduates, claiming universities and colleges enroll mediocre students who then graduate with sub-standard qualifications.
Students will be allowed to participate in summer schools at the university and they will have online access to Lancaster’s library. Lecturers will be flown in from the UK when necessary.
After completing their studies, graduates will receive the same degree certificate they would have if they had studied in the UK. “We will be giving students a UK education without them having to leave,” says Lal.
Although the university will not be targeting women students in particular, it says it has learnt some lessons from the Dubai experience and will set up what’s known as a ‘lunchbox association ’ to help women move forward in their careers.
The campus has appointed John Grainger as its provost. Until recently he was at   Dubai’s Murdoch University.
“Lancaster University has earned an enviable global reputation for exceeding student expectations of quality service delivery in the UK and abroad. Students at the Accra campus will benefit from the same exceptional standards. We offer first-class facilities, a convivial environment and commitment to unswerving student focus,” Grainger says.
Rakesh Wahi, founder of TNE Ghana Limited, says: “This campus is our first education venture in West Africa and shares the group’s vision of creating a network of branch campus experiences in Africa, through quality teaching, state-of-the-art infrastructure, research-led curriculum and innovation in delivery of the curriculum.”
Wahi and Zafar Siddiqi are also the founders of CNBC Africa, FORBES AFRICA, and the ABN360 group.

Private sector takes the gap in GHANA

Realistic and measurable transformation within certain South African industries has been a long journey. In some sectors it has warped definitions as boxes are ticked mechanically.  In others transformation is non-existent. The agricultural sector unfortunately still carries the stigma of embracing change at an extremely slow pace. Its record on transformation is patchy at best.
The wine industry is no different. With its sterling international reputation  and millions of liters of South African wine exported every year, vexed questions still remain on whether this generational industry has genuinely transformed and if so, to what extent?
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In this industry, broad-based black economic empowerment transactions are usually viewed as façades used to divert unwanted questions from those who are pro-transformation. Despite these realities, there are women who are working tirelessly towards altering the status quo, with passion, to bring about significant change within the wine industry.
Nondumiso Pikashe and Carmen Stevens are two of these women. Ignoring skeptics and forecasts of failure, their professional journeys are the result of meticulous timing, dedication and resilience. Responding to a call from former president Thabo Mbeki in 2004 for active players within South Africa’s economy, Pikashe decided to enter an industry completely foreign to her. “Curiosity was what attracted me to [winemaking],” she explains.
“I was always fascinated by wine because in the townships it was an alcoholic beverage that was associated with shattered homes…, while on the other hand, wine’s other face was one of sophistication, class and elegance.”
Wanting to find out more about the characteristics of wine, the more she researched, the more Pikashe became intoxicated by the industry. And thus, Ses’fikile wine was born.
‘Ses’fikile’ is isiXhosa for ‘we have arrived’.
“My wines symbolize the impact that the growing number of women within the industry are making, regardless of the challenges and obstacles they face,” she says, proudly. Pikashe is frustrated by the pace of change in the winemaking industry. She says little is being done in order to pique the curiosity of young black girls.
“I entered the industry through support from associations and groups which are now collectively known as the Wine Industry Development Agency. The work they are doing is commendable; however, more needs to be done.”
Another player in the South African winemaking industry is Carmen Stevens. Unlike Pikashe, Stevens says it was almost a given that she would enter the industry because of how passionate she had always felt about winemaking. A winemaker at the esteemed Amani estate in the Cape Winelands, her passion for the technicalities behind the process has earned her respect throughout the industry. With 18 years’ experience and two harvest internships – one in California and the other in France – under her belt, Stevens is set to make a significant change in the industry.
“I just knew that I wanted to make wine: the smell of the wine cellar; the enchanting and sometimes majestic process of the art of winemaking was fueled by fantasies I developed from reading through my mom’s romantic novels, which were set in the vineyards,” Stevens recalls.
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Stevens is using her passion for wine to change women’s access to land and promote skills sharing.
“Agricultural land needs to be more affordable within the well-known wine regions to increase both female and black participation. The government needs to look into sustainable strategies in order to bring this into being. Skills transfer and development is another thing. Yes, there has been a visible growth of female winemakers within the industry, however, the growth in understanding of the industry holistically still needs much work,” she argues.
Stevens believes that the South African winemaking industry has the opportunity to increase the percentage of women and black role players.
She is upbeat about her future in the industry.
“Amani has given me the opportunity to make wines that are reflection of me, having a brand that carries my name is the next big step,” she says.
Carmen’s recent association with UK-based brand Naked Wine has inspired her to developing her own blends – Carmen Stevens Wines.
“Watching my brand growing each year has been a great experience; this puts me in a position to develop future winemakers as well, that is something that is necessary and which will be very humbling,” she concludes.

Ses’fikile We have arrived

A sea of deep blue flowers borders the highway between Harare and Bulawayo. The 74 acres of heavenly blues, morning glory, dahlias and lemon drops are part of an experiment.
Charlene Mathonsi’s project began a year ago, when the 29-year-old approached new farmers in the Kadoma district of the Mashonaland West province, hoping to convince them to cultivate flower seeds instead of Zimbabwe’s staple maize and tobacco crops. With seeds from the Netherlands and basic skills learned from former white farmers, the Chemagora Collective has produced seven tons of seeds ready for export.
Zimbabwe has exported flower seeds to Rotterdam for more than 20 years, peaking at $60 million in 2004, but as the economy wilted, exports dropped by nearly 70%.
Reviving Lion’s Head, the Mathonsi family farm, meant cooperating with new farmers to turn flowers into a cash crop. But the farm’s survival also relied on earning the respect and collaboration of the 40 laborers who called the farm home for generations before the Mathonsis purchased the 1,236 acres of land.
“For me, the biggest challenge was the women. I think in my first few months I actually cried,” says Mathonsi.
“If you come in as a woman, even though you have the education, these people have been working the land. I’m a young girl, 10 [years] or so younger than them, and I’m instructing them what to do.”
While the male workers immediately accepted Mathonsi in her new role as farm manager, the women resisted.
“They have an established hierarchy. You say something and they do something else. They’re not listening and you feel small,” she explains.
It was only several months later, once Mathonsi had proved that she could work just as hard as the next woman, that she finally gained their trust and respect.
“I think they’re the backbone of this. They’re the ones who work the land, so if you don’t have them on your side, you’re doomed to fail.”
Zimbabwe’s aggressive agrarian reform policies and emphasis on agriculture as a source of independence and income has resulted in a generation of women with more say on the land they till. But Mathonsi is quick to add that it is women of privilege and education, like her, and not necessarily the semi-skilled laborers, who benefit.
“The girl child and women are the most vulnerable. Working with them for me is the most important thing I try to encourage our kids to go to school and try to help financially, especially the girl children, because if you don’t educate them, they’ll be just like their mothers and be back in the field. That is not progress. It’s a cycle of poverty.”
Graduating with a degree in Agricultural Sciences from the University of Zimbabwe, Mathonsi was forced to return to the family farm when she could not find a job in a failing economy.
“It was just such a difficult time,” recalls Mathonsi, who jokes that she may have blocked out the worst memories of that period.
“We would pay salaries knowing that the money would be worth nothing the next day.”
That year’s grain harvest not only became a source of income, but a source of survival, as the family bartered grain for basic necessities and distributed the little that remained for food.
“We were lucky that we grew sorghum that year, because there was no maize in the country and the crop saved a lot of lives not only our own, but people in the area.”
The land Mathonsi returned to after her studies had changed drastically. Between 2000 and 2004, Zimbabwe’s Fast-Track Land Reform program saw 170,000 new black farmers occupy 4,000 white-owned farms. The program was a controversial one, plagued by violence and corruption. Europe and the United States reacted to news coverage of white farms being attacked and burned by sanctioning the already ailing economy.
As the dust settled, many of the new farmers struggled to maintain production rates. The commercial farm next door to the Mathonsis’ Lion’s Head became a subdivided village of 50 families, made up of war veterans, former teachers and other public servants.
Kicked off the land after more than a decade, the former farm owner who Mathonsi did not want to name, formed an unlikely bond with the recent graduate, and became her mentor.
“All the contacts, all the advice, is all [from] him,” says Mathonsi who credits her success to this vital relationship.
She was advised to convert the struggling dairy farm into a beef and crops farm.
Kadoma district is Zimbabwe’s rural heartland, and innovative ideas like the Chemagora Collective are not common practice elsewhere in the country.
In areas with better rainfall and more fertile soil, the sacrifices of Zimbabwe’s land reform policies are beginning to yield a healthy profit.
Zimbabwe Takes Back Its Land is a collection of reams of data and tables of statistics that aims to prove that the land rogram implemented by President Robert Mugabe’s regime has created a new generation of farmers who are reaping the rewards. Following first-time black farmers, who turned Zimbabwe’s large-scale tobacco, maize and cattle farms to small-scale communal farms, with more unconventional crops like tomatoes and pumpkins, the publication argues that the three decades of empowering black farmers has made southern Africa’s former bread basket a model for reformation.
However, the Commercial Farmers’ Union has pointed out that Zimbabwe’s agricultural output is less than a third of what it was in the 1990s and that the country is still reliant on food aid.
“There is always a period in which farmers are learning and looking for investment,” says Ben Cousins, a researcher with the Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies.
Cousins says Zimbabwe’s strategy shows that it is possible to subdivide singularly owned commercial farms to benefit more people.
“There is lots of room for agency for the farmers themselves, they do not have to be passive beneficiaries of the state,” he explains.
For Mathonsi and the farmers of the Chemagora project, circulation of the US dollar has been a relief, with their flower seeds selling at $3 a kilogram. They say the government’s goal to reintroduce the Zimbabwean dollar will be a setback to the their cash crop.
“What kind of Zim dollar would it be? Would it be the Zim dollar that runs like it did the last time?” wonders Mathonsi.
While land reform has empowered half a million black farmers since independence, the policy still does not guarantee ownership, because the state-based tenure system means that land can no longer be bought or sold.
“When you get this land, what says it’s yours?” asks Mathonsi, who believes real empowerment is marked by a title deed.
“I feel safe in the fact that my parents bought this farm, my family owns it. Yes, our title deeds don’t work, but I have that knowledge that through any sweat, any tears, I know its ownership. It’s not going away, so I will do anything in my power to make sure it works out.”
Cousins agrees that ownership would make access to finance easier.
“Yes rights need to be clarified, but there’s no evidence that you need private property for land to be productive.”
Now as comfortable branding a cow as she is negotiating export rates, Mathonsi and Lion’s Head have weathered the economic storm.
To break even each month, the farm needs $3,000, but Zimbabwe’s continued political isolation and subsequent sanctions make credit impossible. Mathonsi has had to sell a few head of cattle to get the hard cash she needs to pay wages.
Despite the continuous challenges, land in Zimbabwe is as emotional an issue as it is practical. Usually ready with a smile, Mathonsi is passionate but pragmatic as she talks about what the land means to her.
“Land is where the cash is at. Working the land is the basis; I’m the block on which the economy is built.”
She is also clear that it is people who ultimately give land its value.
“It’s not a nine-to-five job. It’s driving pregnant women to the hospital at three o’clock in the morning because they are your workers, you have to look after them. You bury them. It’s like a village. You are a success if they are a success. Failing is not an option. You cannot disengage.”

Harvesting change: Zimbabwe’s new farmers

When her father first glimpsed her, he said, ‘Bogaletch’, meaning ‘flash of light’. And so it would be. In her relentless fight against female genital mutilation and gender-based violence, Ethiopian physician and human rights activist Bogaletch Gebre carries the torch for women around the world.
She was born in rural Ethiopia in the 1950s. It was a time when Ethiopian women had limited aspirations and their experiences were restricted to their villages. Like 125 million girls across 29 countries in Africa and the Middle East, Gebre went under the knife, not for medical reasons, but for the ancient practice of female genital mutilation (FGM). Thirty million girls worldwide are at risk of being cut in the next decade. Gebre wants that number to be zero.
FGM is the cutting away of part or all of the external female genitalia. The procedure is usually performed on girls from infancy to the age of 15. The painful practice has no health benefits and can cause fatal infections. Gebre points out that FGM may also have long-term consequences, such as infertility, damage to adjacent organs and birth complications.
“Women should not be mutilated alive for the pleasure of men. Basically, there is no other reason [for FGM] but to control women’s sexuality. The FGM practice is to cut female genitalia; the inner labia, the outer labia, and then sew it together … And then you reopen that which you have sewn when she marries. And after she gives birth, let’s say she has multiple births, you sew her up like she is some kind of object, to reduce the size of her vaginal hole, because it is widened through her giving birth,” says Gebre.
When Gebre became the first girl from her village to attend school further than the fourth grade, later receiving a scholarship to study in Israel and the United States, she promised she would be back, and that she would make a difference.
During her studies, Gebre realized FGM had no cultural or religious roots.
“Culture, according to the United Nations, is man-made. It is not ethnic, it is tangible, nobody belongs to one culture… Whenever we talk about human rights issues in Africa, it’s always about culture, so culture is being used as a scapegoat. If it is not in our religion, if it is not in the Bible, if it is not in the Koran, why are we using this culture as our culture?”
When she returned to Ethiopia in 1997, Gebre co-founded KMG—Kembatti Mentti Gezzimma-Tope, which means ‘women of Kembatta working together’—with her younger sister, Fikirte. The non-profit organization promotes communication and dialogue between communities and their leaders.
“We brought together representatives of the community: the young, the old, the educated, religious leaders, even government officials and police. They sit and discuss together, learn about each other and analyze the problems in the community together. And find a way to solve it, to reach a consensus and create their own social contract to abide by,” she explains.
With funding from USAID, international organizations and embassies, KMG promotes women’s education and increased economic opportunities for women. The organization also focuses on demystifying taboos about HIV/Aids and other cultural practices, such as widow inheritance and bridal abduction. Seventy percent of KMG’s three million beneficiaries are women. A measure of the organization’s achievements is the change in mindset on FGM. In 1998, every single woman in Ethiopia’s Kembatta Tembaro region had undergone FGM. A decade later, 97% of people living in the area opposed the practice. But Gebre is not satisfied yet; at 74%, Ethiopia’s national prevalence remains high.
In May 2013, Gebre accepted the King Baudouin African Development Prize on behalf of KMG. The award, which is worth $200,000, provides recipients with a platform to address international aid agencies.
Despite everything she has achieved, Gebre remains humble, describing herself as an ordinary person who works for the betterment of humanity.
And her efforts appear to be bearing fruit. In December, the UN General Assembly called for the complete elimination of FGM. Around 1,775 African communities heeded the call and publicly declared their commitment to end the practice.  ,
When her father first glimpsed her, he said, ‘Bogaletch’, meaning ‘flash of light’. And so it would be. In her relentless fight against female genital mutilation and gender-based violence, Ethiopian physician and human rights activist Bogaletch Gebre carries the torch for women around the world.
She was born in rural Ethiopia in the 1950s. It was a time when Ethiopian women had limited aspirations and their experiences were restricted to their villages. Like 125 million girls across 29 countries in Africa and the Middle East, Gebre went under the knife, not for medical reasons, but for the ancient practice of female genital mutilation (FGM). Thirty million girls worldwide are at risk of being cut in the next decade. Gebre wants that number to be zero.
FGM is the cutting away of part or all of the external female genitalia. The procedure is usually performed on girls from infancy to the age of 15. The painful practice has no health benefits and can cause fatal infections. Gebre points out that FGM may also have long-term consequences, such as infertility, damage to adjacent organs and birth complications.
“Women should not be mutilated alive for the pleasure of men. Basically, there is no other reason [for FGM] but to control women’s sexuality. The FGM practice is to cut female genitalia; the inner labia, the outer labia, and then sew it together … And then you reopen that which you have sewn when she marries. And after she gives birth, let’s say she has multiple births, you sew her up like she is some kind of object, to reduce the size of her vaginal hole, because it is widened through her giving birth,” says Gebre.
When Gebre became the first girl from her village to attend school further than the fourth grade, later receiving a scholarship to study in Israel and the United States, she promised she would be back, and that she would make a difference.
During her studies, Gebre realized FGM had no cultural or religious roots.
“Culture, according to the United Nations, is man-made. It is not ethnic, it is tangible, nobody belongs to one culture… Whenever we talk about human rights issues in Africa, it’s always about culture, so culture is being used as a scapegoat. If it is not in our religion, if it is not in the Bible, if it is not in the Koran, why are we using this culture as our culture?”
When she returned to Ethiopia in 1997, Gebre co-founded KMG—Kembatti Mentti Gezzimma-Tope, which means ‘women of Kembatta working together’—with her younger sister, Fikirte. The non-profit organization promotes communication and dialogue between communities and their leaders.
“We brought together representatives of the community: the young, the old, the educated, religious leaders, even government officials and police. They sit and discuss together, learn about each other and analyze the problems in the community together. And find a way to solve it, to reach a consensus and create their own social contract to abide by,” she explains.
With funding from USAID, international organizations and embassies, KMG promotes women’s education and increased economic opportunities for women. The organization also focuses on demystifying taboos about HIV/Aids and other cultural practices, such as widow inheritance and bridal abduction. Seventy percent of KMG’s three million beneficiaries are women. A measure of the organization’s achievements is the change in mindset on FGM. In 1998, every single woman in Ethiopia’s Kembatta Tembaro region had undergone FGM. A decade later, 97% of people living in the area opposed the practice. But Gebre is not satisfied yet; at 74%, Ethiopia’s national prevalence remains high.
In May 2013, Gebre accepted the King Baudouin African Development Prize on behalf of KMG. The award, which is worth $200,000, provides recipients with a platform to address international aid agencies.
Despite everything she has achieved, Gebre remains humble, describing herself as an ordinary person who works for the betterment of humanity.
And her efforts appear to be bearing fruit. In December, the UN General Assembly called for the complete elimination of FGM. Around 1,775 African communities heeded the call and publicly declared their commitment to end the practice.

Bogaletch Gebre: The Light Bearer

Humans have been communicating with each other since time immemorial. Some of the earliest forms of exchanging information are cave paintings, oral storytelling, smoke signals and even the beating of drums.
The way we communicate has developed in leaps and bounds since those prehistoric days. Today, if you have something to say, the chances of a broken telephone scenario should be less likely.
As tools to communicate have modernized, so people have been able to connect more easily over longer distances. One of greatest instruments is social media, which has refashioned the way women connect and network with each other.
“I think the world of social media has been the greatest revolution, there’s no censorship, there’s no gatekeepers you join an online community and the networking occurs in that community. It’s one of the best things that has ever happened,” says Judi Nwokedi, who is member of the South African chapter of the International Women’s Forum (IWFSA), a network which connects preeminent women around the world.
“These days you don’t have to be in a physical space to be inspired.”
The value of networking in all its forms cannot be underestimated. It has become essential to business success. As a result, there has been a proliferation of national, regional and international networks targeting women.
Although businesswomen and -men often network for the same reasons, including extending their client base and contacts, just like communicating, we go about it in very different ways.
Eva Muraya, of Vital Voices Global Partnership, an organization that trains and empowers emerging women leaders and entrepreneurs across the world, says this is proof of the increasing potential of networks to be used as vehicles to enhance knowledge sharing and professional and business growth.
“Additionally online resources such as www.wisdomexchangetv.com have revolutionized information sharing and peer learning by creating a platform through which women trailblazers from Africa can motivate and inspire other women through sharing their stories which are captured on video,” says Muraya, who is also the CEO of Kenya’s Brand Strategy and Design (EA) Ltd.
The traditional old boys’ club of clinching business deals over cognac and cigars is a seldom seen feature in women’s networks – and it is not often that you come across women in these circles.
“There are the structured opportunities. If you, for example, look at the WEF (World Economic Forum)… none of the organizers would be naïve or stupid enough to exclude women. But often it is at the CEO level, the chair level, at the president level, so automatically your numbers are reduced,” says Nwokedi, who is a leader in nuclear energy and infrastructure on the continent.
Nwokedi says the boys’ club is about wealth creation, and women have a lot of catching up to do.
“In order to make a gain you first have to be organized, and that is why we form these women’s organizations, because the first thing they are going to say is, ‘make the business case’. We have to disaggregate the data to see how many engineers there are; how many female engineers there are; how many black female engineers there are; how many young black females there are. You have to drill down. In order for us to say, ‘things have got to change’ we have got to prove why and then we have to develop a program that gets that dividend. It’s a lot of work and men don’t have to do that.”
Networks are especially important for women, who more often than not face inequality in the workplace and at home.
“[Networking] was initially conceptualized according to the American idea, by women who are CEOs; women who are presidents; women who are chairs. Because once you are at the top… it’s extremely lonely. You couldn’t afford to let your guard down in the boardroom or even in your corporation, because that is perceived as weakness when it comes to women. So women then get together to support each other when they are the top of their craft,” says Nwokedi.
According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor’s 2010 Women’s Report , women need to do improve the way they network.
The report finds women entrepreneurs and business owners are inclined to have smaller and less diverse networks than their male counterparts. They are also more likely to seek guidance from family members.
“Men’s networks tended to be as large or larger than those of women… to encompass more people in one’s work: entrepreneurial, professional, and market environment… Academic research suggests that entrepreneurs having broad and diverse networks are more likely to have better access to the information and knowledge that is associated with high growth potential and venture performance.”
Although there is recognition that women need to catch up in fully utilising networks, they do use a variety of forums on the continent to connect. These include roundtables, think tanks, seminars, workshops, conferences, LinkedIn, and cocktail events. And of course political parties will always remain an excellent way of establishing contacts.
In South Africa, the IWFSA recognizes the need for mentorship and nurturing. It has a strategic leadership program with the Gordon Institute of Business Science. The year-long course prepares senior women with leadership potential for top posts in their organizations.
The next big network to keep your eye on is the Brics Women’s Initiative. It is being steered by a group of key women, including Nwokedi. It aims to increase women’s participation in Africa as well as in the member countries of Brics – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
Although the group recognized at its last summit there was a need for women-owned ventures, the recently formed Brics Business Council tells a very different story. It comprises 25 people, and only two of them are women.
“Because the criteria (is not) a 50/50 representation, there are fewer women…
“It’s not even institutionally that women are excluded; it’s organically that they are excluded. You need to re-engineer the institutional arrangements to make sure women are included,” says Nwokedi. i

Subverting  the old boys club: New ways of networking

Kopano, dress me up but I don’t want to look like $1 million.’
This is an instruction that 27-year-old Kopano Motsoeneng is very familiar with. ‘While the wheels of fashion are moving at the speed of light, many women still value the safety of classic, timeless style. These are the women Motsoeneng caters for. He is a stylist whose passion for making women look good has motivated him to embark on a career where he has the pleasure of telling high-earning women what to wear.
Motsoeneng’s introduction to the fashion world came at the tender age of 11. He recalls advising girls in his school on their Matric farewell dresses.
He also devoured the contents of any fashion magazine he could get his hands on, until he finished high school, and registered at a fashion school in Johannesburg, South Africa. Here Motsoeneng learned that being a fashion student did not necessarily mean that all you could become was a designer. He was hopeless at making patterns, but he was a skilled salesperson.
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He joined small boutiques, which allowed him to interact with cust-omers and introduce them to different designers’ brands. Motsoeneng identified a unique opportunity to pair designers with potential clients.
In 2012, he launched Strictly KP. His main order of business was hosting intimate fashion events where a number of local designers and potential clients gathered in a small venue set up like a boutique store. Designers showcased their garments and clients nibbled on snacks and sipped champagne as they shopped.
With each gathering, Motsoeneng cemented his relationship with the circle of designers. They began to trust him to sell their clothes, while maintaining respect for their labels. His network to diversify, as clients began seeking out Motsoeneng’s fashion advice talent on a more personal level.
One day he received an unusual request: ‘I’m going on a trip, do you mind packing for me?’
“All I thought was, ‘you only see this on reality television!,” Motsoeneng laughs.
It was his first personal styling job. The client was going to Europe and needed him to pack her luggage “strategically”. He was paid $37 just to pack lightly enough to allow the woman space for shopping spree purchases. She must have been happy with his decisions; she still calls on him regularly.
With each consultation, Motsoe-neng aims to help a woman identify her signature style and feel confident about the choice. His typical clients are self-assured corporate leaders, who need him to diffuse the black, grey and navy items in their wardrobes with some vibrant colors that can they can wear to social events.
Over time, however, Motsoeneng has learnt that not all corporate women wear black, grey and navy suits. Twenty-nine-year-old head of operations at Liberty Intelligence Insurance, Lerato Olahleng, expresses her quirky personality within the confines of her ‘boring’ office dress code.
When she first met Motsoeneng, he helped her pick out an outfit at the store where he worked. He studied her style and would keep her informed about any new stock that she might be interested in before it hit the shelves.
Olahleng says Motsoeneng has helped see her wardrobe’s potential.
“He’s helped to get rid of that feeling you get when you look into your wardrobe and think you have nothing to wear,” she says.
For Olahleng, money is no object when it comes to Motsoeneng’s services. She says she loves being able to sleep in on a Saturday morning and spend much-needed quality time with family and friends, instead of being at the mercy of busy, overwhelming malls, trying to find something to wear.
Motsoeneng introduced Olahleng to the brain child of 29-year-old designer Isabelle Lötter, Sies Isabelle! The label is aimed at larger women, who enjoy looking both feminine and fashionable.
And when Olahleng saw an ele-gantly draped tweed coat-dress by Sies Isabelle!, she couldn’t resist. Lötter says the coat-dress is a top seller because it is a flattering cut.
“My target market is a curvy figure like myself. I basically design for me… there’s a big gap in the market for curvaceous women who have style but can only shop at stores like Donna Claire,” explains Lötter.
Her range is so wide that both her 75-year-old grandmother and a 14-year-old cousin can wear her designs. Lötter particularly appeals to professionals like Olahleng, because her clothes are expressive and not rigidly corporate; they can easily be dressed up or down.
The fashion business is a tough one. Countries like China are mass producing their goods much faster than the local industry.
“South Africa’s textile industry is almost non-existent at this point… a lot of my fabrics are imported,” Lötter admits.
She says South African designers are no competition for China, mainly because local consumers are not discerning enough.
“They don’t understand why they should pay $67 for a dress when they can buy it for $9.60 at China Town.”
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Despite what you may think, Motsoeneng does not only style women. He consults with one couple on a weekly basis, planning both their wardrobes for the week ahead. At first he was advising only the woman, but one day she asked him to style her husband, a prominent businessman who travels frequently. When he received a message saying, ‘Thank you so much for picking this outfit for him, he went on his trip with a spring in his step’, Motsoeneng realized how much a good outfit can do for men as well.
That aside, most of his clients are women. One of the biggest lessons he has learnt is that even high-powered businesswomen have insecurities.
“As much as women say they don’t care what people say, they really do, because they are often judged by what they look like,” he explains.
One of Motsoeneng’s more unusual clients is neither a businesswoman nor a corporate player. Karusha Pillay is a nursery school teacher who, in her own words, “doesn’t get dolled up for work” in case she ruins her clothes. Outside work, however, she embraces her femininity and wants to look glamorous.
Pillay does not earn a lot of money, but says she finds Motsoeneng’s services invaluable, because he sources pieces that are tailored for her body shape and which last season after season. Pillay says she was won over by Motsoeneng’s personal approach.
“Styling is very personal because I come into your personal space, but I always try to establish trust with my clients on first consultation,” says Motsoeneng.
Another of his secret weapons is using young, talented South African designers who have the potential to compete with international labels like Zara, but cannot afford the rent. Sourcing from less recognized brands gives his clients a sense of exclusivity, which is often lost when trawling the retail chains in a shopping mall.
And despite all the challenges that the South African textile industry presents, Motsoeneng believes that “you are not taking a step back; you’re simply doing the cha-cha”.

Pairing to get the right fit

More than five years ago, she found herself on the wrong side of history when South Africa’s ruling party opted for leaders whom it believed would be more connected to the country’s poor and working class.
But now Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, who has been in the background since then, has been appointed as a leader of the world’s largest bureaucracy, the United Nations (UN).
For the next four years, she will serve as the executive director of the UN Entity for Gender Equality and Empowerment of Women, known colloquially as UN Women.
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“It’s always been a defining feature for me, that if anything works, it must work for women. I have always known that this is my benchmark and I must get there as quickly as possible… If I cannot facilitate change, God forbid!” she says.
The body, which was formed in 2010, is tasked with promoting women’s rights and their participation in global affairs. UN Women can boast some successes, such as helping women gain seats in seven national elections, and reforming laws and policies in 26 countries to increase women’s access to economic assets and social protection.
But Mlambo-Ngcuka has her work cut out for her. Although there are calls, which she supports, to develop a stand-alone UN goal to achieve gender equality, the organization faces serious challenges, including inadequate funding.
Also, in a time when the world has to deal with economic uncertainty, more than often, budget cuts negatively affect the progress of women and entrench gender inequalities.
Mlambo-Ngcuka joins a list of women who were shining stars in former South African president Thabo Mbeki’s cabinet and have since left the country to take up international positions&#8230; Mlambo-Ngcuka, African Union Commission chairperson Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and special envoy on gender at the African Development Bank, Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi, could all, arguably, in their own right lead South Africa.
However, the experience Mlambo-Ngcuka gained while she served in government, and her well-known
tenacity, will now be put to use on the global stage.
She insists Africa will be a priority, but not at the expense of other regions.
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“When you think about Africa, the first thing that comes to your mind is poverty. And yet there’s a lot of good things in Africa… I want for us to start picturing a different Africa and bring forward that Africa does have resources. That there is a fighting spirit that we need to harness,” she says.
Mlambo-Ngcuka is not alone in her approach. For far too long, Africa has been depicted as the begging bowl of the world , a perception that Dlamini-Zuma also wants to remedy.
Mlambo-Ngcula says she plans to work closely with Dlamini-Zuma, as well as Africa’s two women presidents, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf from Liberia and Malawi’s Joyce Banda.
“I would want to go to these women on the issues I’m going to be pushing forward as they relate to Africa. I actually want to harness their stature and the influence they have to make a push. Also, I will need them in working with the other leaders in Africa.”
There are strategic countries on the continent whose buy-in Mlambo-Ngcuka will have to get, such as Nigeria, with its wealth of powerful and influential women.
Women across the world face a multitude of challenges, which change in severity depending on where they live and what their social standing is. Mlambo-Ngcuka believes that if she can improve the quality of education and reproductive health, her time at the UN will not have been wasted.
“One of the things that is uniquely disabling sometimes to women, is failure to address their reproductive health. Women have an unwanted baby when they are not ready to support the child. You trigger inter-generational poverty and the life of that woman comes to a standstill. So allowing women to reach their full potential without having to deal with the responsibility of having a family they have not planned for, is, for me, very important.”
Mlambo-Ngcuka took office in August 2013 and has a number of initial ideas on how she will improve UN Women. When her predecessor, former Chilean president Michelle Bachelet, resigned to focus on politics, she was criticized in some quarters for not leaving much of a legacy. Some of this was blamed on her role being confined to raising awareness about women’s living conditions and UN Women having no executive powers.
“I don’t want to be all gung-ho right at the beginning, and maybe create that vibe for myself, but really, I am also concerned. I cannot leave my country to be a token. We need to do something that is destiny-changing for women.
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“In my discussions with UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon, he made it very clear it is important that we make an impact on women. I am hoping that I can lean on him and when it turns out actually that there isn’t scope for that, I can go and speak to him.”
Mlambo-Ngcuka’s strategy is not to reinvent the wheel, but to build on what people are currently doing. Her aim is to give UN Women a much stronger presence and make sure that women’s issues are more visible.
“I want to make sure women are in your face… I just feel our voice is a bit muzzled, a bit timid. And I feel that this is one time where you want to lead from the front.”

SA’s global citizen: The new head of UN Women wants to redefine the world for women.

Apocalypses, domination by robots, intergalactic wars or futuristic post-Armageddon societies have never appealed to me. I have always been a bit of a literary and culture snob, and have turned my nose up at any science fiction. I have never watched any of the Star Wars movies.
But to be a good writer, you need to read a lot. Not only that; you should read widely. So last year, in the spirit of being a good writer, I gritted my teeth and took my first journey into the world of sci-fi.
For my initiation, I chose award-winning South African writer and documentary maker, Lauren Beukes. Admittedly, I chose her acclaimed novel, Zoo City, because I have a strong bias towards Afrocentric literature. And the fact that it offered an alternative vision of South Africa’s Johannesburg appealed to me.
Zoo City is not Beukes’s first piece of speculative fiction, her debut novel, Moxyland, outlines a futuristic, corporate Apartheid Cape Town. However, Zoo City is the one that has been highly praised; it won the Arthur C Clarke Award (think Nobel Prize for science fiction), among others.
And with good reason. As I read, it becomes less of a grudge read and more of a literary experience. In a world where there is an unspoken rule that African fiction must be political and/or historic to be considered worthy, this book is refreshing and innovative. Beukes deftly interweaves traditional African belief systems with traditional sci-fi to create a post-modern, unexpectedly viable, vision of Johannesburg in the future.
I became more interested in the genre and soon discovered that Beukes is not alone or a pioneer. Afro-futurism has been around for more than 100 years, with its roots in the African Diaspora. African Americans, former slaves, imagined futures where men and women, white and black, were equal.
Early pan-Africanist W.E.B. Du Bois, for example, wrote a number of science fiction narratives.
Over the years, both Africans on the continent and in the Diaspora have increasingly developed Afro-
futurism as a literary and cultural movement that blends science and magic realism in order to explore Africa in the past, present and future.
In a talk entitled ‘Afro-futurism in popular culture’, Kenyan film director Wanuri Kahiu speaks of Afro-futurism as a means of reclaiming the past. Look online for a recording of her TEDxNairobi talk and you too will get a real sense of the brave and unconventional woman behind her film, Pumzi.
After winning five awards at the African Movie Academy Awards in 2009 for her debut film, From a Whisper, this was Kahiu’s first venture into Afro-futurism. Pumzi was also Ken-ya’s first sci-fi film.
The 23-minute film imagines a futuristic, post-apocalyptic Africa, where there is no water and where people live in contained communities. Released in 2009 at the Kenya Film Festival, Pumzi went on to be screened at the prestigious Sundance Film Festival in 2010, as part of the New African Cinema program. Kahiu hopes to turn the film into a full-length feature.
Nigerians have always been the toast of African literature, so perhaps it is not surprising that Nigerian-American author Nnedi Okorafor is at the forefront of the push to move African sci-fi from the fringe into the mainstream literary canon.
In addition to the science fiction prizes she has won, such as the Carl Brandon Parallax Award, Okorafor has some of the biggest awards in African literature under her belt. She received the Wole Soyinka Prize for Literature in Africa for her young adult book, Zahrah the Windseeker, and the Macmillan Writer’s Prize for Africa for her children’s book, Long Juju Man.
Of the three women I refer to in this column, Okorafor, a Chicago State University creative writing professor, is particularly prolific in African sci-fi, and has published six books in the genre so far.
The world of science fiction is one of infinite possibilities. Afro-futurism is a cultural movement that increasingly reflects the current mood of optimism about the political and economic future of the continent. It is, as I have discovered, an important genre. And that more young African women such as Beukes and Kahiu are joining and even leading the movement is not only exciting but also necessary.
If one of the central tenets of Afro-futurism is the ability to reclaim the past, then this movement will give expression to the political, cultural and artistic aspirations—and frustrations—of a new generation of young African women.

Hustlin’ for a Legacy

Girls of Afro-futurism

A couple of weeks ago I went on a real vacation. I didn’t bring my computer, I shut off my phone. The only time I even thought about work was when my mind wondered to topics of long term strategy. I didn’t worry about the day-to-day operations at my company even once. Why? I did not need to. I had a strong and capable team that kept everything moving forward in my absence.
Early in my corporate career, a manager leaving on vacation said to me, “Unless my house is burning down, don’t contact me.”
I was shocked by his brazen disinterest in work while he vacationed. “This guy is not going to last long,” I thought. Instead, it was one of the best leadership lessons I ever received. He had a chance to take a well-needed break. His team members had a chance to stretch their leadership, develop confidence, and grow. His actions were signs of an effective leader. But most leaders balk at the idea that a manager-level employee would even think of telling others that they will not be available during their vacation.
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<h4>Surviving vacation</h4>
In his Forbes article Take A Serious Vacation: A CEO’s Advice To All CEOs, Jim Moffatt, the chairman and chief executive of Deloitte Consulting LLP, says, “If your business can’t survive your vacation, you’ve got a bigger problem.” He suggests that leaders and managers treat their vacations as a “test” – not just of the leader’s ability to take a break, but of what happens to the organization when they are absent for an extended period of time.
However, the inability to take a vacation isn’t limited to the corner office. A recent study by Kelton Research commissioned by the Radisson hotel chain indicates that nearly half of the total American workforce doesn’t use all of their allotted vacation days. From my experience leading HR functions at mid to large sized companies, I can confirm that the core offenders are managers and leaders. And when asked why this group of hard working professionals left vacation days on the table, most sighted their fear of losing momentum or missing quarterly or annual objectives. In other words, they felt that things would fall apart as soon as they left.
Perhaps these managers and leaders are a product of a workforce that simply has too much on their plate. Kelton’s study did find that heavy workloads were one of the primary reasons workers decided not to take more time off. If this is the case, organizations must ask a critical question – who is taking a break from the day-to-day operations to think about the long-term strategy of the business?
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<h4>The problem with doers</h4>
If corporations don’t ask and answer this important question, they may very well find themselves with an organization full of doers and no leaders. While all companies certainly need both, employees need to be able to recognize and respect the difference. An organization full of doers is simply not going to last.
The story of Edwin H. Land and Polaroid is a glaring example of the fate of an organization of doers, brilliant as they may be. As Polaroid grew, Land had teams of people working in shifts at his side. As one team wore out, the next team rotated in to continue the work. Land was at the core of everything at Polaroid and was even accused of wearing the same clothing for eighteen consecutive days because he refused to take a break. Subsequently, his successors mismanaged the company and the once-great organization headed into a downward spiral. In his 2012 book Instant: The Story of Polaroid, Christopher Bonanos tells the story of Polaroid’s competitor Kodak referring to Land’s company as “He” instead of Polaroid. In October 2001, Polaroid declared bankruptcy.
I have worked for both doers and leaders. Despite the hours doers work, I always learned more from the leaders. One of the best leaders I worked for told me that as an HR executive I should be sitting in the lobby greeting employees and reading the paper. This is a bit extreme, but what he was saying is that I needed to spend my time thinking about the big picture – our people strategy to drive our business forward. I shouldn’t be down in the weeds chasing up performance reviews, reviewing improvement plans, or attending every vendor meeting. He encouraged me to build a strong team to do that work.
The other problem with doers is that they frequently don’t lead by example. It is disingenuous when a leader tells me to stop working and take a vacation or recover from an illness, but a week later they show up to work coughing and sneezing. Some doers will boast about not having taken a proper vacation in 10 years. Working for these leaders, I never felt I was allowed to fully unplug despite their encouragement to do so. As with all aspects of effective leadership, walking the talk is the only way to create lasting change.
&nbsp;
<h4>Making yourself redundant</h4>
A leader is not doing their followers, boss, or organization any favors by building a team that can’t function without them. They have a duty of care to teach their followers to fish instead of fishing for them. At day’s end, the true test of effective leadership manifests itself when a leader is absent.
The one thing that all effective leaders do is make themselves redundant so they can move on to even greater challenges and help more people – knowing that the team they built will flourish and carry on the mission. All my personal success as a leader has been a result of living this principle. The only boasting I do is about taking all my vacation each year. I encourage you to do
the same.
As a leader or manager, here are three simple questions you should ask of yourself daily to ensure you are practicing effective leadership and building sustainable teams and organizations:
<ol>
<li>Can I go on vacation without my computer and phone?</li>
<li>If I get sick, can I focus on getting better without working or being in contact?</li>
<li>If I quit today, would my team/organization continue to be successful and grow with minimal disruption?</li>
</ol>
If you can’t answer ‘yes’ to all the above questions, you need to either build a new team, develop the one you have, start trusting your people to work on their own making it okay to fail and learn from mistakes, or move into a role that does not require people management.

Make Yourself Redundant:

Helena Dolny has always taken the road less traveled. Currently, she heads up Grey Matters, a consultancy which focuses on leadership development, strategic planning, coaching and institutional transformation.
At 60, she is an accomplished, world-renowned empowerment specialist, writer and author of several books in fields as diverse as coaching, economics, organizational design and biography. Her vast expertise in navigating the choppy waters of corporate South Africa on the cusp of change and transformation is exactly what drew me to her as a potential columnist for FORBES Woman Africa.
I also knew Dolny had a way with words after reading her poignant account in the book Slovo: The Unfinished Autobiography. In it, she explains the context in which her late husband, Joe Slovo, wrote his memoirs, and why they were left incomplete. Slovo, one of my personal heroes, is a legend and icon of South Africa’s liberation struggle. He was the country’s first housing minister and served in former president Nelson Mandela’s Cabinet. Slovo died of leukemia in 1995, barely a year after democracy dawned. Dolny was his second wife.
Her inside track on the vagaries of corporate South Africa struggling to come to terms with change comes from her many experiences in the public and private sector. In 2005, Dolny served as the director of leadership development, coaching and mentoring at Standard Bank. It was a role which she says offered her the opportunity to recalibrate the bank’s delivery team. Prior to that, in 2001, she was with the human resources division of First National Bank. Her book, Banking on Change, is an engaging and candid account of her tumultuous experiences as the managing director of the Land and Agricultural Bank of South Africa. Dolny headed up the bank from 1997 until her dramatic departure in 2000, when she was embroiled in a spat over the direction of the organization and the pace of transformation.
Dolny also served as a member of the Presidential Commission on Rural Financial Services, and in 1996, was an advisor to South Africa’s first minister of agriculture and land affairs, Derek Hanekom.
Her journey towards becoming a coach and empowering women leaders in the corporate sector spans many decades. Dolny’s professional passage started when, as a youngster, fresh out of university and armed with a degree in agrarian economics, she made the journey from the north of England to the shores of Africa. Along the way, she came into contact with revolutionaries, rural peasants, presidents and academics, all of whom set her on a course that would invigorate her life forever.
The heady winds of change were sweeping across the continent. Dolny had been involved in the anti-Apartheid movement during her student days in England. Through her work in Zambia, Mozambique and later in South Africa, she soon came into direct contact with those at the epicenter of change in southern Africa.
Explaining her decision to work in empowerment and development, and the connection between land and economics, Dolny often makes reference to her parents. Both were World War II refugees; her father was Polish and her mother hails from what was then Czechoslovakia. Her folks were ‘salt of the earth’ types, she says, and could have become very different people, were it not for their class positions . While her mother, who had greater class mobility because she finished school later on in life , became a nurse in England, her father was a factory worker.
“Although my dad worked in a factory, he was very inventive and always practical. In a different society he could have been an engineer. When growing up we heard stories of their lives during the war. Given my parents’ upbringing, I am not surprised that I wanted to go into an enabling environment,” she says.
“In my gap year I travelled to Zambia. I had to come via South Africa, and eventually, after completing my studies, I ended up in Mozambique.”
Dolny’s passion for and interest in land issues was sparked in part by a friend’s father, who owned a dairy farm. She also remembers wanting to study something ‘practical’ instead of philosophy. She enrolled in agricultural economics at Reading University in the United Kingdom, as conventional wisdom at the time dictated that “because you were a girl”, it was advisable to “read economics, rather than science”.
Shortly after Mozambique won its independence in 1975, Dolny found herself designing a bookkeeping system.
“When [The Mozambique Liberation Front] Frelimo took power in the 70s it was a very powerful time. It was a time of barefoot doctors doing stints in villages among the rural masses. I remember, at that time, my first task was designing an accounting system for people who had just come off a literacy course. Then we could dream,” she says, smiling.
As an agrarian economist in Mozambique’s Ministry of Agriculture, Dolny worked with farming cooperatives on development planning and bookkeeping from 1976 to 1981. She then joined a Canadian non-profit organization called Cuso (Canadian University Service Overseas), which supported development projects in Mozambique.
Dolny has traversed both the public and private sector as an economist, banker, empowerment specialist and currently as an executive coach. However, the thread that runs through her work over the years is a belief in the need to build and develop strong and ethical leadership in public and private institutions.
“The fish rots from the head,” she says, stressing the importance of developing and harnessing credible, quality and capable leaders.
As a member of Comensa, and with a string of degrees (including an MBA and a Master’s in professional coaching) under her belt, Dolny is at the cutting edge of her industry on the continent.
Asked to explain the difference between coaching and mentoring, she says, “Coaching is customized learning. Mentoring is about cloning little mini-mes.” Coaching, she continues, allows her to develop systems that are uniquely tailored to the individual.
In the November edition of FORBES Woman
Africa, Dolny will be debuting as a regular columnist, offering insights into how to navigate corporate culture and architecture across the African continent.

Helena Dolny

When most of us think about rubbish, we imagine dirt and all kinds of nasty diseases. But for South African businesswoman Lilly-Girl
Dukada-Hentcho, waste is a treasure.
She has been in the waste management business in the country for nearly three years, and is now looking at expanding not only across South Africa, but also elsewhere on the continent.
“The environment is my passion and waste is gold. Success is not only about money; it’s also about changing the mindset of people about waste and recycling,” she explains.
Dukada-Hentcho is part of a group of women entrepreneurs who are stepping up to the plate in the waste management sector. It is an industry that is growing rapidly in South Africa and other parts of the world, as people become more enlightened about conserving the environment , and consumerism continues to spread.
“As we know, the whole world is encouraging Africa to take a big step in saving the environment. The old waste collection mandates have changed now from just collecting waste and dumping.”
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Dukada-Hentcho, along with her husband, Philippe, formed DNH Recycling and Waste Management Services in Midrand in Gauteng three years ago. The company focuses on separating waste at source.
Although she had had some experience in running a waste management company in the United Kingdom, when she started her venture  in South Africa, Dukada-Hentcho says the sector was virtually a no-woman’s land.
To add to her woes, recycling did not happen on a large scale in the country, with many considering it a trendy suburbia practice.
“It was like entering the lion’s den. We had to offer free pilot [projects] for them to see what they were buying,” she says.
But since then, the picture has changed. Dukada-Hentcho credits her strong belief system and willingness to take risks for the success of her company, which also does waste analysis for clients, including Famous Brands, at
38 sites.
In its first year, DNH brought in $100,000. The following year that had increased to more than $240,000. This year, she plans to double her revenue again. The company is looking at ventures in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Nigeria, and is also in meetings with the University of Johannesburg with a view to collaborating on a waste energy project.
Dukada-Hentcho is just one example of a number of South Africans cottoning on to the fact that waste has value.
In May, Johannesburg, South Africa’s economic hub, held its first waste management summit, and Mayor Parks Tau challenged delegates to view rubbish in a different light. On average, South Africans each produce about one kilogram of waste a day, and if Johannesburg does not start diverting waste on a much bigger scale, none of the current landfill space will be around in 10 years’ time.
According to a baseline study conducted by the government, the country generated 108 million tons of waste in 2011. Ninety-eight million was disposed of in landfills, and only 10% was recycled through various forms, such as separation at source, composting and buy-back centres.
The latest statistics, from 2009, estimate South Africa’s waste sector to be worth $1 billion. Government, which has earmarked the green economy – waste in particular – as a priority area to build the economy, believes the sector can grow from its current 0.56% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), to 1-2% of GDP. In Europe, the eco-industry is showing growth rates of 7-8% per annum.
The concept of a green economy is emerging much faster in South Africa compared to the rest of the continent. In fact, it is one of the most important elements in the country’s new growth plan; the creation of a lower-carbon economy is being punted as a major source of jobs.
South Africa’s Industrial Development Corporation, a development finance institution, has earmarked $2.5 billion over five years to 2015/16 for the development of green industries. In partnership with German development bank, KfW, the IDC has also allocated $50 million to a Green Energy Efficiency Fund. It is aimed at stimulating investments by local entrepreneurs. One of the projects already in progress generates biogas from abattoir waste. Funding options for waste management and recycling technologies are also being developed.
“Innovation is considered crucial in growing and sustaining the waste industry. We need new and better ways of doing things,” Henry Roman, from the national Science and Technology Department, told delegates at the waste summit.
Traditionally the sector, which the United Nations Environment Program values at $437 billion a year worldwide, has been epitomized by a large participation of women at the bottom end. There are about 15 million waste pickers in developing countries and they largely consist of women and children.
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However, in South Africa, the face of the sector is changing, and women are increasingly becoming key players. They include the president of the Institute of Waste Management of Southern Africa, Suzan Oelofse; the CEO of PET Plastic Recycling Company (Petco), Cheri Scholtz; the operations director of the Paper Recycling Association of South Africa, Ursula Henneberry; and EnviroServ group property and marketing director Delia Lavarinhas.
Oelofse says researchers in the waste sector at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research and at universities are mostly women.
“Women care more. We realize more what the impact is of bad management, and also we care more about the aesthetics of waste,” she explains.
At household level, Oelofse believes there will be an increased focus on recycling and waste separation across the country as South Africans become more aware about preserving the environment.  Also, she says there are a number of growth areas in the waste management sector that women can tap into.
These include extracting usable resour-ces from industrial waste, separating waste at source and waste-to-energy projects, such as developing landfill sites for the harvesting of methane gas as an alternative energy source.
There are also opportunities for women in the post-consumer recycling of water and soft drinks bottles that contain polyethylene terephthalate (PET).
Under Scholtz’s stewardship, PET recycling has almost doubled in tonnage over four years. Close to $19.3 million was paid for sorted, baled bottles delivered to recyclers, and approximately $42 million was injected into the local economy through the sale of recycled PET for downstream products.
“There is still much work to do to capture the remaining percentage of bottles that were not collected, and with the post-consumer PET recycling targets set to rise to 58% in 2017, with a growing market size, increasing the volume of bottles collected for recycling is thought to be the best method of achieving this,” explains Scholtz.
“There is a need for more visible, accessible infrastructure in the form of drop-off facilities, buy-back centres and materials-recovery facilities. This is enabled by increased investment in the recycling sector, making it a bankable sector.”
Also, Scholtz says there is a need for constant innovation in the field of design, to ensure that the bottles produced are actually recyclable, and that labeling is improved so that consumers are encouraged to recycle them and they do not end up in landfills.
Another growing area of opportunity is South Africa’s development of a sustainable tires recycling industry. According to the Recycling and Economic Development Initiative of South Africa, a waste management fee on new tires is expected to generate around $70 million per year. Eighty percent of it will be ploughed directly into developing the industry.
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While the outlook for the sector is bullish, women still face an uphill battle if they want to make their mark.
Aliena Ratenazi, an entrepreneur who has been researching the waste management industry for four years, and who is getting into the business herself, says that women are often the worker bees who compete at the lower-level structures.
“The barrier of entry in the waste sector comes with a heavy price tag for women… Today, a lot of women contribute to the household and need to make their businesses a success, which within this sector is not an easy task,” says Ratenazi.
“South Africa as a country is not giving the support in the field of educating, funding and training women to enter the waste sector, as we have no role models in this sector&#8230; [It] can be a huge green industry that can focus on major transformation with the optimization of women in waste, where the benefits are considerable and tangible. [This], in turn, would mean huge growth for South Africa, as there is an abundance of waste available in our landfills,” she says.
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As South Africa shifts focus to industrializing the country in a sustainable way, the managing of waste will become more of a priority. The time is ripe for women to investigate the different technologies out there, which will have a seismic impact on how the industry operates, and ultimately, how much money can be made

TURNING RUBBISH INTO GOLD

It is widely accepted that for many countries on the continent gross domestic product (GDP) is understated. The question is by how much.
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Ghana created quite a stir when revisions to its GDP data announced in 2010 showed that the country’s economy was 60% bigger than previously believed. Ghana was thus transformed overnight from a low-income to a middle-income country. This happened as GDP per capita, an important measure of wealth, rocketed from about $550 to $1,100.
The news prompted the World Bank’s chief economist for Africa, Shantayanan Devarajan, to declare Africa a “statistical tragedy”. Granted, it is an overstatement. But his comment emphasizes the implications of this shortcoming – if the data is inaccurate, those governments and development agencies could be making poor decisions.
What happened was that Ghana changed the base year for its data from 1993 to 2006, taking into account the deep structural changes in the economy during that period.
The base year is the reference year in terms of GDP, expressed at constant prices, and it determines the importance which various sectors have for the economy. In Ghana’s case, the country’s registry of business was out of date and the national accounts failed to capture the output of these companies. According to the Ghana Statistical Service, the share of services in the economy rose from 36.1%  to 51.1%, while the contributions of industry and agriculture both fell.
Many economies in the region have base years which are more than a decade old – which compares poorly with the international best practice of revising the base every five years. This is particularly significant in the case of Nigeria, the continent’s second-biggest economy, which has announced it is in the process of changing its base year from 1990 to 2010. The new GDP figures will be announced next year. There is a general perception that after taking telecommunications and entertainment into account, the economy will be about 40% bigger than it is at present.
According to the regional research head for Africa at Standard Chartered, Razia Khan, the revision means that Nigeria’s economy will be just 10% smaller than South Africa’s. With its economy growing at around 7% a year, compared with South Africa’s pace of less than 3%, the Nigerian economy is likely to be the biggest on the continent by 2015. The revision will also affect the whole of sub-Saharan Africa. Nigeria’s economy already accounts for nearly one-fifth of the region’s total output, so an upgrade means that the combined economies of sub-Saharan Africa will be significantly bigger than estimated at present.
This poses the question: how many other economies on the continent are also bigger than the current data suggests? According to Kim Zieschang, the Division Chief of the Statistics Department at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Washington-based lender anticipates providing technical assistance to a “large number” of sub-Saharan African countries, and in fact is already doing so. This means that many countries have asked the IMF for help in upgrading their economic statistics, just as Ghana and Nigeria have done.
According to Lyal White, Director of the Centre for Dynamic Markets at the Gordon Institute of Business Science, there are two problems, one is the absence of data and the other is the poor quality of data presently available. Many sub-Saharan African economies have large informal sectors which are notoriously difficult to cover.
It is likely that that there will be upward revisions of GDP data in other countries in the region, but the magnitude of those changes are difficult to assess ahead of the conclusion of their processes, Zieschang says. What is certain is that the revisions will radically alter the ranking of sub-Saharan African countries by size.
So what do the changes mean for countries in the region? Global investors are likely to sit up and take note of bigger economies, which will be more attractive destinations for their capital. There will be more information on which sectors to invest in, and governments will have a better idea of what to do to foster development and growth. Some of the ratios which gauge the quality of a country’s economy will improve – debt to GDP ratios will fall, as will budget deficits, which are also measured as a ratio of the size of the economy.
On the downside this could encourage governments to spend a bit more recklessly. At the same time, the ratios of official revenue to GDP will fall, putting pressure on governments to increase their tax base. A significant drawback is that richer countries may no longer qualify for aid or concessional loans from international agencies. Nonetheless, IMF officials say there would be a good case to revise upwards the thresholds for this type of support.
On the upside the pending upward revisions to GDP data will present sub-Saharan Africa as a more significant player in the global arena.

Author: Forbes Woman Africa

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