Leffie Naosa
Case Studies – Maize Mill
Leffie Naosa, 41
Entrepreneur
Leffie Naosa, 41, is a saleslady at Ukeya Maize Mill and Grocery, a company owned by Naomi Kuluwani. Naomi was a Grow Movement client who was mentored by Alison Morton from the USA.
After failing to attain her secondary education, Leffie was just staying at home helping her mother in the village with household chores and farming. Her mother lives in another district which is 80 kms away from the town. Tired with village life, Leffie decided to search for a job and moved to Blantyre.
In 2014, Leffie was employed as a salesperson by Ukeya Maize Mill and Grocery.
This is her first salaried job and she works full-time from 7.30am–5pm Monday to Saturday. She got this job through a friend who told her that Ukeya company was looking for a sales person. The friend came to town for business. After hearing the news, Leffie decided to come and meet the owner of Ukeya. She was interviewed and got the job.
Through this job Leffie is now able to help her mother in hiring people to help in farming, buying seeds and fertilizer for the farm, paying school fees for her two sisters who are at home and buying the necessities for the family.
Consultant
Business challenges and objectives of the project
Fred’s big ambition was to increase from 100 birds to 30,000, and to eventually own a feed mill as well. Taku and Fred worked together on a plan of how to make this dream come true using small incremental steps. Taku wanted help Fred move from being a dreamer to an operational entrepreneur. On Taku’s advice Fred wrote a business plan and started to have real clarity of vision on how to achieve his dream.
Fred says that Taku was a real support during this time, but they lost touch in 2013.However Taku’s sound advice stayed with him, and he says that it gave him the courage in his business. He entered into another programme (the Rwanda Business Accelerator Programme), and found three investors.
The Results
Due to the business planning skill, Fred was able to articulate his vision and modify the business model. Instead of selling eggs to the local community, he now breeds and sells the birds themselves. He sells the owners feed and services for the birds as a package, and makes an agreement with them to buy the eggs back and sell them at the market. Fred said, he was connected by Grow movement to the Rwanda accelerator program run by Educat (Grow Movement partner organization in Rwanda) for investment opportunities. Through the same programme three investors came on board and facilitated expansion and diversification. To date the business is building at a steady rate, and he was able to take on two new employees, an accountant and a stock manager.
The Impact on Leffie
“I am very happy now that I can provide for my aged mother and two sisters at home through this job”
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