Hazyview and SBI business chambers provide opportunities for community
The public was invited to attend the presentation held by the Hazyview Business Chamber with and supported by the Small Business Institute (SBI) at Little Pilgrims Boutique Hotel on October 12, during which future possible social developments were discussed.
Many business owners and managers joined the meeting in the hope of new development strategies for the various tourist attraction towns.
The Hazyview Business Chamber is affiliated to the SBI, which is the voice of small businesses in South Africa and formerly known as the Afrikaanse Handelsinstituut, to provide support to business communities formal and informal.
The newly formed Hazyview Business Chamber in conjunction with the SBI, invited Nicolaas Palm, a project manager of Kroonstad Business Chamber serving on the national forum of the SBI, to present the successful strategies he followed to reach the goal of the intervention programme he had implemented in the Kroonstad Local Municipality to rehabilitate the water and sanitation facilities in Viljoenskroon in 2016.
He explained to the people at the meeting the necessary steps that had to be taken for progress before achieving the successful collaboration between the community and local municipality.
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The business chamber’s goal with the presentation was to inform the communities that they have rights, and that their opinions and ideas are valuable for the development of businesses and infrastructures.
“Effective collaboration between the community, business sectors and municipalities, instead of fighting legal disputes in court, is far more productive in addressing the basic needs of local communities and regenerating the growth of local economies,” said André Visser, one of the founding members of the Hazyview Business Chamber.
The business chamber will provide support to gather initial information with a free application on smart phones available to all chambers and will establish a local data centre so local entities will take charge and take part, to ensure the implementation of the strategy for local economic plans, in partnership with the local municipality council to achieve success.
“Basic services must be managed outside the political sphere, for the community, by the community. This can only be done in a community partnership with the local municipality,” said Palm.
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According to Visser, the long-term goal is not to just develop a community business chamber for Hazyview, but to join hands with all business chambers in the Lowveld and escarpment to benefit all in the whole of the Lowveld towns, such as Hazyview, White River, Graskop, Sabie and Lydenburg.
The next meeting will be on November 17 at Perry’s Bridge in Hazyview at 18:00.
If a person or organisation is interested in joining hands with the business chamber, they can contact 013 013 0318 or andrev@hazyview-bc.co.za.
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