Sekhukhune TVET student wins national competition
At the event that was attended by the minister of small business development, Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, Rampedi took the number-one spot for “I have a business idea” with his diaper-recycling idea, winning R20 000 in prize money and a trophy.
SEKHUKHUNE – A local TVET College student, Tshepo Rampedi, has won the Allan Gray’s first annual Entrepreneurship Intercollege National Competition, held recently at the Birchwood Hotel and OR Conference
Centre in Gauteng.
Sekhukhune TVET College’s Centre for Entrepreneurship supported five students to take part in the competition’s Limpopo regional rounds, held to select the top three to represent the province at the national competition.
The college managed to take the top two spots and sent two students, Tshepo Rampedi and Baby Makua, to the
nationals.
Kwanele Mkhwanazi, the head of Sekhukhune TVET College’s Centre for Entrepreneurship, highlighted that the
mentorship provided to these students was just one of many support services provided by their incubator to SMMEs and co-operatives.
“The purpose of the competition was to identify and support student entrepreneurs nationally across the TVET sector. This platform provided them an opportunity to pitch their innovation or existing business to a panel of judges, thus inviting investment into their businesses.”
The winners of each category at the regional rounds were invited to the entrepreneurship intercollege finals, to
pitch their innovative business idea to the judge panel for a share of R100 000; R20 000 for each category winner and R10 000 for each runner-up.
At the event that was attended by the minister of small business development, Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams, Rampedi took the number-one spot for “I have a business idea” with his diaper-recycling idea, winning
R20 000 in prize money and a trophy.
Ndabeni-Abrahams stressed the importance of the entrepreneurship within the TVET sector and its role in employment creation.
Rampedi said, “I was very happy when given the opportunity to present my business idea that I was sitting on for a long time, being naive about the opportunity.
“The Centre for Entrepreneurship Rapid Incubator at the Sekhukhune TVET College showed its potential and continued to support and encourage me, also not forgetting Allan Gray for presenting such an innovative initiative where students like myself can be exposed to such opportunities and engage with big co-operatives and policymakers.”
