Tenacious couple’s love for agriculture earns entrepreneur award
These tanacious entrepreneurs demonstrated how it is possible for your hands to make something out of determination and hard work.
The love for agriculture is what keeps the Ubucwibi Agriculture founders going strong and rising above their many challenges.
Nosipho Phiri (50) and Bafana Ntuli (57) claimed second place in the 2016 Ilembe Chamber Entrepreneur Competition.
These tanacious entrepreneurs demonstrated how it is possible for your hands to make something out of determination and hard work.
In 2015 they said they noticed the overgrown vacant land next to Imbuyiselo Secondary School in Doringkop (a safety hazard so close to the school) and they saw an opportunity. So they asked the principal to allow them to use that land for farming vegetables. With the help of Enterprise Ilembe, that is how Ubucwibi Agriculture was born.
“Before that, we had tried forming a co-operative with other local women but it was not successful. The garden that we had next to the school was very productive and we were producing vegetables that we supplied to Enterprise Ilembe and local vendors,” said Phiri.
As with many small farmers in KZN, the couple were victims of drought, forcing them to stop operations.
When we returned to the school this year we discovered the land had been taken over by an NGO. But they didn;t let that stop them.
“We have found new land that we are now going to buy as soon as we can secure the money. We are not going down without a fight.
“We invested a lot of our savings into the land at the school and we are prepared to do the same to our new land. We will succeed,” said Phiri.
Phiri previously worked as a community legal advisor with the Community Law and Rural Development Centre. But she wanted to be her own boss.
She said joining The Entrepreneur competition has given her the edge to stay afloat in a tough economic climate.
“The competition taught me a lot. Things like bookkeeping, finance management and building my markets,” she said.
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