Budding entrepreneurship brings opportunity

African entrepreneurship
– albeit unstructured
at times – is budding,
bringing much opportunity for
business across the continent,
says Stefan Sakoschek,
chairman and CEO of the Global
Inspections Group.
Established in 2001, the
company is an independent
third party authority that
performs quantity, quality and
analytical inspection work
from agricultural commodities
to metals and minerals and
consumer products.
“The African market is
extremely important in the
southern hemisphere as it is a
major supplier of raw materials
and a consumer of finished
products,” says Sakoscheck.
While the continent continues
to pose its own set of challenges
– be they logistics, the lack
of infrastructure or political
instability – its functioning is
showing growth, with much
interest from the rest of the
world.
“Raw material exports to
the Far East, namely China,
are still a major focus. From
our perspective, metals and
minerals moving to the East
and consumer goods coming
back to the continent are very
important and it’s where we play
a role,” says Sakoschek. “There
is also potential for imports of
agricultural commodities such as
wheat and rice, which are always
in short supply in South Africa.”
He says the weakening of the
rand obviously favours exports
in the sub-region at present.
“As a country, we have little
to export ourselves, but our real
opportunity is geographical.
We are a good trading
platform towards landlocked
neighbouring countries. We
also have the required port
infrastructure for that even
though congestion
is a concern.”
Having recently expanded
its fleet of vehicles with the
acquisition of 10 new bakkies,
Global Inspections is upbeat.
“The continent is full of
resources and while it has
historically been cash-weary and
cash-driven, in a strange way
this has had the positive effect
of protecting the economies
of the continent from most of
the crisis brought about by the
excesses of the “cheap credit” in
the northern hemisphere.
It is also interesting to
note, says Sakoschek, who is
currently the chairman of the
French South African Chamber
of Commerce and Industries,
that more European companies
have taken an interest in
southern Africa in the past 12
months, with over 100 new
membership applications to
the Chamber. “Could it be that
southern Africa has become,
if not the new ‘Business
Eldorado’, at least a safe haven
for global business in the mid
and long term?”