The Other Side of the Coin
On Thursday, we saw the South Africa that many tourists do not get to see, or as one of our tour guides described it, “the other side of the coin.” We heard a panel discussion by three influential South Africans – Terry Bell (a journalist, author, and political analyst), Cedric Buffler (CEO of Micro-MBA), and Sipho Puwani (Managing Director of Ikamva Iabantu) on the influence of apartheid, AIDS, and other socio-cultural challenges upon business practices in South Africa, particularly social entrepreneurship. In fact, Mr. Buffler and Mr. Puwani were both nominated for the Schwab World Entrepreneur Award recently, with Mr. Buffler actually winning the award. Their comments were extremely insightful and everyone seemed to come away with a much better understanding the economic and sociopolitical environment of South Africa.
Following the panel discussion, we headed out to the oldest township in South Africa, the Township of Langa, where we ate lunch at the home of a township resident. The food was typical of a Sunday lunch in a township, featuring a huge array of local dishes. In fact, many of us felt more like we had eaten a Thanksgiving dinner afterwards.
We next visited the Township of Khayelitsha. This township houses around 1.5 million people, or about 25% of the population of Cape Town. Much of the township consists of makeshift shacks. Despite the lack of permanent shelter, there was certainly not a lack of hospitality. The people could not have been more welcoming as we visited a small bed and breakfast, toured a community center, played with children in a daycare, and shopped a little for handmade gifts.
South Africa, here we come! As part of the Massey School’s graduate program, 18 graduate students and I departed today for Cape Town. This International Business Field Study course is unique among graduate business programs because all Massey graduate students are required to complete one international trip during their degree program. Though we will be in South Africa for only a little more than a week, we have a full itinerary. We plan to visit with various businesses and hear from a number of speakers in order to learn more about doing business in South Africa. In addition, this trip includes a special focus on social entrepreneurship. We are going to see real-life examples of how individuals have used their entrepreneurial skills to solve social problems and empower the poor, and in the process, better understand the interrelationships between poverty, AIDS, and economic development. The trip is not all about business, however. We also plan to see why many people consider South Africa to be the most beautiful country in the world. In the process, we might even catch sight of a baboon, an elephant, and hopefully some African penguins.