the pride of Africa's women entrepreneurs
by Dr. Memuna Williams, DBA
In the journey of developing Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programs, perseverance plays a pivotal role. From the early days of launching a business to the strategic CSR phase and beyond, perseverance ensures that SMEs continue to evolve, adapt, and push through obstacles, ultimately creating significant societal value.
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by Dr. Memuna Williams, DBA
In today’s rapidly changing world, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have a unique opportunity to drive sustainable growth and positive social impact. Below, I will explore how social responsibility, entrepreneurship, and leadership can intersect to create lasting change, particularly in Africa’s diverse and dynamic landscape. SMEs can use this to build on their work to further integrate social responsibility into their operations, cultivate entrepreneurial mindsets, and embrace leadership models that drive inclusive growth.
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Elmarie Pereira
Lioness Weekender Cover Story
Memeza, a South African social innovation organization using ICT to protect vulnerable women and girls
Elmarie Pereira, co-founder of Memeza, has dedicated her life for the past 9 years to the impact Social Innovation can make in South Africa, specifically using innovative ICT to combat Gender Based Violence and protect the most vulnerable people. Elmarie joined her co-founder, Thuli Mthethwa, in 2015 after the loss of her sister due to gender based violence and her wish to help make a change. Through various pilots done with Memeza's crime fighting technology, Elmarie & Thuli, together with their team, have proven to reduce sexual offences by 67% and murder rate by 9%. Under Elmarie’ s leadership, the Memeza team was also able to develop the Social Partner Mobile Survey tool which to date has created over 2700 youth jobs through auditing over 15 000 liquor outlets Nationally for COVID compliance. Memeza has won over 10 industry awards for the impact made in fighting crime through this woman lead organization and has created 27 jobs.
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Zainab Dakik, co-founder, Maternia (Tanzania)
Startup Story
Zainab Dakik is a Tanzania-born expert on emerging markets, with a particular focus on production and logistics. She is the co-founder of Maternia, an organization led entirely by women aiming to reduce the rate of stillbirths through an innovative low-tech, low-cost medical device. She possesses valuable experience through working in refugee camps, conducting research, and managing distribution channels. At present, she is actively engaging with Maternia's beneficiaries on-site, fostering stronger connections to better understand and address their needs.
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Rayana Edwards, founder, Harem (South Africa)
Startup Story
Rayana Edwards, founder of Harem and based in South Africa, has been in the clothing and textile industry for more than 25 years. She has travelled the world as a buyer and curated manufacturing for local and global brands including her own. Her project Sari for Change allows for her story of mixed heritage to be told whilst it provides an intervention for poverty alleviation and hope for many women who are unemployed. She is a mother to 5 girls, a life coach and serial entrepreneur. Her award winning project is recognized for its pay it forward model to create a legacy within the sustainable fashion space, a term they have coined, a sacred economy.
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Lioness Weekender Cover Story
Helm, an impact driven enterprise promoting the full inclusion of persons with disabilities
Amena ElSaie co-founded Helm in 2012, an organisation which to date now serves more than 200 companies and 2,700 persons with disabilities in Egypt and the region. Amena drives the organization’s vision, strategy, and growth as it provides sustainable and unique solutions for public and private institutions to foster policies and strategies towards effective and sustainable inclusion of persons with disabilities in the workplace and marketplace.
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Achenyo Idachaba-Obaro, founder, MitiMeth (Nigeria)
Achenyo Idachaba-Obaro, founder, MitiMeth (Nigeria)
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Maria Auma, founder of Blue Luxury Investments (Uganda)
Maria Auma, founder of Blue Luxury Investments (Uganda)
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Lioness CoLab
Entrepreneur and founder of luxury handmade accessory brand AAKS, Akosua Afriyie-Kumi, is seeing a dream come true this month. Her high impact Weaving for Change project is seeing a collaboration with Nandos to create beautiful, woven pendant lamps in their London restaurants.
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Linda Mukangoga, co-founder of Haute Baso
Linda Mukangoga, co-founder of Haute Baso (Rwanda)
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Sofia Cassimo, founder of SamSara Development and Investment
- Sofia Cassimo, founder of SamSara Development and Investment (Mozambique)
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- Esmeralda De Souza-Obwaka, founder of Spez Limited in Kenya
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Fair Trade practices enhance your brand appeal....
- Bethlehem Tilahun Alemu is founder and Managing Director of soleRebels, the world's fastest-growing African footwear brand and the only Fair Trade-certified footwear company in the world. Growing up in a poor suburb of Addis Ababa, Bethlehem decided that there was only one way to defeat poverty – use local craftsmanship to make products that can compete in the global marketplace. She decided on footwear and today 70,000 pairs of shoes leave her factory every year. soleRebels has been expanding rapidly and today exports to no fewer than 45 countries and is targeting 50 stand alone soleRebels retail stores across the United States by 2018 and 500 worldwide by 2022.
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Temie Giwa-Tubosun, founder of Lifebank (Nigeria)
- Temie Giwa-Tubosun is the founder of Lifebank in Nigeria, a company that helps hospitals discover blood and other essential medical supplies and delivers them to hospital in the right condition. Temie deploys mobile and web technology, smart logistics, and Artificial Intelligence to build an end to end marketplace and cold chain logistics. Her mission is to save 1 million lives in 10 years. In May 2017, Temie was selected as part of "six entrepreneurs who demonstrate the positive role women are playing in creating opportunities and preparing the region for the Fourth Industrial Revolution" by the World Economic Forum on Africa.
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Kerryn Krige
Can business change the world? Can the world change business? These are questions asked by author Kerryn Krige and her co-author Gus Silber in the new book The Disruptors: Social entrepreneurs reinventing business and society.
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Lisa Curtis, founder and ceo Kuli Kuli Foods
There is a definite art to pitching your company, products and brand to potential investors, and it is an art that Kuli Kuli Foods founder and ceo, Lisa Curtis, seems to have mastered. She has just appeared on CNBC's Power Pitch programme, winning new fans in the process. CNBC's Power Pitch is similar to Shark Tank where entrepreneurs get the opportunity to pitch their company to a panel of three investors. After the pitch, the investors have to decide... are they in or are they out? In the case of Kuli Kuli Foods, they were definitely in!
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Megan MacDonald, founder of SASA Designs by the Deaf
For deaf women in Africa, life can be tough and the opportunities for employment and independence extremely limited. But one social entrepreneur, Megan MacDonald of SASA Designs by the Deaf, is making real and lasting change happen for these women by providing meaningful employment, training and a sense of community, plus the ability to support their children and their education.
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As part of Lionesses of Africa's month-long celebration of social entrepreneurs who are making a real difference in Africa, we are profiling some of the women social entrepreneurs from the US who have stood out for us over the last year. Their passion for the continent, combined with their desire to solve some of the biggest challenges in Africa, can be seen in the real impact that these women social entrepreneurs are making. Often collaborating with inspirational women on the ground in countries across the African continent, they are creating new and exciting business opportunities for women artisans, stimulating micro-entrepreneurship ventures that empower women in local communities, and improving and uplifting people's lives. We salute all these inspirational social change-makers and the women they collaborate with!
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Justine Kiwanuka (L) & Monica Masiga (R), Living Goods micro-entrepreneurs
Across the African continent, particularly in rural areas, promoting good community health and wellness to local people remains a challenge. Life-saving products and services don’t do any good unless they get into the hands of the people that need them and know how to use them. Social entrepreneurship venture, Living Goods, is helping to solve the “last mile” problem by recruiting, training, and managing the performance of Community Health Promoters. Monica Masiga in Kenya, and Justine Kiwanuka in Uganda, are two such Living Goods micro-entrepreneurs who are making a difference.
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Melanie Hawken, Lerato Kadiaka and Matilda Sekoakoa at the launch of the Help A Child Grow Foundation Book Drive in Johannesburg on July 11th, 2015
The challenge of inspiring young, underprivileged and orphaned children in South Africa to learn to read and develop a love of books and learning, is one that social edupreneurs Matilda Sekoakoa and Lerato Kadiaka, have embraced. Their inspirational Help A Child Grow Foundation is positively and tangibly changing the lives of these children each day by collecting books and building libraries for schools in need.
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