Markets go mobile for youth entrepreneurs

2012 Global Youth Economic Opportunity Conference

MacDaniel Powell, Liberia (powellmc70@gmail.com)

Sabine Meitzel, Switzerland (meitzel@horizon2030.com)

Washington DC, IDB Conference Building, 12 September 2012

Responding to partners requests, innovative and practical

T@H system of mobile applications for better trade

launched by ITC in 2005

• innovative, tailor-made solutions for trade

• using latest technology

• partner-driven R & D

• applications and solutions for SMALL business

• work through partners and multipliers

Operating principles

• Acceptable, affordable and accessible services

• Public-private partnerships

• Business relevance and sustainability

Tailor-made solutions for Trade at Hand T@H

Trade at Hand solutions for business

Export

Value Chain

Export

Marketing

& Branding

Export

Management Development

EXPORTER

Trader

Trade

information

via mobiles

Marketing

& sales via

mobiles

Mobile

Supply-chain

solutions

The Trade at Hand components – innovative mobile

solutions to tackle the challenges of small business

4

2005/6 2007/8 2009/10 2011/13

Burkina Faso

Mali

Senegal

Mozambique

Maldives

Uganda Benin

Fiji

Kyrgyzstan / Tajikistan

Liberia

5

Web and mobile combinations in T@H

• mPrices

• mCollect

• mAlerts

• mMonitoring

• mMarketplace

Evolution of the “Mobile Marketplace” as a

Trade-at-Hand solution • 2009: innovative “Trade at Hand” pilot application for Liberia’s Marketwomen generated

business for participating market women and farmers:

• 50 market women, 50 farmers, 3 months trading

• Proof of concept validated; ownership of T@H taken up in 2010 by the Angie Brooks

International Centre (ABIC)

• Lessons learned taken on board for a broader roll-out and launch of T@H Liberia – the

Mobile Marketplace - through Liberia’s President in 2011, addressing the illiteracy issue

and sustainability considerations

• 2010-12 “Affaires Mobiles” in Benin adapts the Mobile Marketplace, working through an

operator (voice / Interactive-Voice-Response IVR) to reach more users;

• Local partner feedback and engagement in Liberia and Benin provide positive signs –

currently development of T@H License System and launch of T@H partner network by ITC

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Trade at Hand implementation approach 7

Local or global

sourcing?

In it for the

service, or the

money?

Does an app

exist already?

Who comes the

request from?

Training owners & users;

building sustainability

Selecting IT providers;

developing and testing

Selecting or designing

mobile solutions

Understanding target

beneficiaries’ challenges

Who will manage

the system in the

end?

Who can serve

as a pilot

group?

Ready to

incubate the

service?

1 4 3 2

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• Build on what exists, according to needs • Start small; iterate; build brick by brick • Embed sustainability during system design • Design the business model with stakeholders • Build capacity and coach during early system usage • Use “reusable” IT (respect open standards, use and share free and open source softwares

and coding systems)

• Provide a complete, independent solution to a bottleneck identified by business users

• Scale to match available capacity and manage expectations

A few basic principles learned and applied in T@H solutions development

Giving young people a stronger grip on Trade at Hand:

Opportunities for young people in T@H • Young people are respected by the established business

community as “IT” smart and thus as a competitive source for business and trade info

• T@H can easily be added to existing and budding youth enterprises

• A business accelerator for groups and/or individual youth entrepreneurs

Challenges met in developing youth entrepreneurs for T@H • Obtaining inputs and answers from young partners which reflect

reality • Lack of pro-active response by young people to evolving

opportunities, lack of entrepreneurial drive • Attracting long-term interest and keeping momentum, beyond

simple project money hook

Challenges & Opportunities

11.

How visible are young people as actors in value

chains? Quotations from a typical technical cooperation project:

• How: “Training

sessions in

plantation and

distillation to

multipliers…” Women? Youth? Men?

• Why: “Sizeable

additional income

for farmers…” Youth?

Men? Women?

• What: “Patchouli production by two cooperatives in Rwanda (Nasho and Burgarama) with a total of 1,300 farmers…” Men? Women? Youth?

Vision for Liberia’s

National Export Strategy

“… a competitive and inclusive exporter

of value added products that

sustainably uses resources for the

benefit of all Liberians” (July 2012)

Growth and economic reconstruction in Liberia

- Chillie pepper

- Cassava

- Palm oil

PUT-THE-MARKET-IN-YOUR-

POCKET!

Making cents with Trade at Hand

(T@H) Liberia?

Better business to reduce poverty and increase food security

Women are:

• 60% of Liberia’s farmers

• 80% of Liberia’s traders

• Vital for Liberia’s economy

Impact areas:

• Peace and security

• Food security

• Poverty reduction

• Trade for development

…and the YOUTH???

ITC lends “mobile” hand to Liberia’s Market Women

16.

Liberia’s youth

is the greatest asset for the country’s

economic development …. Where are they?

Trade at Hand (T@H)

for Liberia’s Marketwomen in 2009

Trade

at Hand

Youth Event

Angie Brooks International Centre

T@H for Liberia’s Marketwomen

Put the market in your pocket: Liberia's

Mobile Marketplace … is a real-time market information system for

farmers, buyers, sellers, traders and marketwomen

in Liberia, regardless of their location and function

in the value chain

…offers Liberian buyers and sellers a mobile link to

the market cheaper than the traditional phone call

…has shown interesting potential for youth

enterprises and young entrepreneurs

What does T@H - Mobile Marketplace -

provide? With market info on quality and quantity of agricultural produce, current market prices and on transportation, T@H:

• Reduces the amount of farm goods that get damaged after production

• Eases access to market produce for different levels of buyers

• Transcends the problem of Liberia’s road situation

• Allows farmers to spend more time on their farms and produce more food

• Reduces the physical risks of marketers

• Gives greater access to rural farmers

Why is T@H - Mobile Marketplace - better

for business than a simple phone call?

- T@H balances the lop-sided access to instantaneous

business information at the lower end of the value chain

- T@H strengthens food suppliers, enabling them to defend

their position on their product’s value chain and contributing

to food security

- T@H generates additional potential for revenues at the

lower end of the value chain and increases market

transparency

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T@H LIBERIA - Mobile Marketplace

T@H Liberia can be accessed through two platforms:

Web-based T@H platform

Interactive-Voice-Response (IVR) T@H platform

The two components are inter-connected, and feeding into the same database. Users of the IVR platform can post and access offers that are posted via the Internet platform and vice versa.

T@H Transactional Cycle

Trade at Hand – the Mobile Marketplace

Live Demo!

President Sirleaf launching T@H for Liberia’s Marketwomen

(Voinjama, Liberia, July 2011)

Support of the Government of Liberia for

T@H as an opportunity for Liberian youth

Ministry of Education

Ministry of Youth & Sports

Min

istry

of

Ed

uca

tion

Min

istry

of

Yo

uth

&

Sp

orts

Young Liberian

Entrepreneur

T@H - a mobile marketplace for Liberia’s

young entrepreneurs?

Young Liberian

Entrepreneurs

(1) Angie Brooks International Centre (ABIC), Monrovia

identify teams of trained young T@H Ambassadors. If needed, recruit and

train additional college graduates, members of Liberia’s YWCA and/or Liberia

Marketing Association (LMA) aged between 22-25 as T@H Ambassadors

(2) Trained young T@H Ambassadors

develop tailor-made T@H services to marketwomen and farmers in rural

areas including at the border to Sierra Leone, backstopped by ABIC, YWCA

and LMA

T@H - a mobile marketplace for Liberia’s

young entrepreneurs?

(3) Trained young T@H Ambassadors

launch and provide relevant T@H services in major market places in rural

Liberia, including at the border with Sierra Leone. Train 80 to 100 young

entrepreneurs from the respective rural communities in T@H service

provision, for start of local T@H youth enterprises

(4) Potential T@H Youth Entrepreneurs

set up T@H youth enterprises, either on a team basis in major market places

or as individual “T@H Booth” enterprises in their rural communities,

backstopped by ABIC, YWCA and LMA

T@H Institutional Trade Support Network

• In Africa

Bénin ABEPEC

Burkina Faso MEBF, CCIBF

Mali CCIM, OMA

Senegal ASEPEX, TPS

Mozambique IPEX

Liberia MCI, ABIC

• In Asia

Kyrgyzstan AFVE

Tajikistan TCCI

Maldives MEDT

Fiji MPI, NCLC

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T@H Focal Points in 9 countries

The T@H Trainer/Adviser Network

In Africa

Benin 1

Burkina Faso 3

Mali 1

Senegal 4

Mozambique 1

Liberia 4

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Rest of the world

Maldives 2

Fiji 2

Kyrgyzstan 1

Tajikistan 1

20 Advisers available to support your T@H roll-out

Next steps for T@H:

Harness the power of the T@H Network

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The T@H Platform

• Exchange Forum

• Knowledge Base

• m-App repository

• Roll-out methods

• Experiences from

around the globe