CEDA, MCM partner for stronger citizen impact in mining

Pauline Dikuelo | Monday September 7, 2026 06:00

The partnership, formalised through a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed on Tuesday, brings together MCM’s supply chain and industrial ecosystem with CEDA’s mandate to develop, capacitate, and finance citizen entrepreneurs.

For MCM, the partnership is intended to strengthen citizen supplier development and expand the participation of local businesses in its supply chain and diversification activities.

MCM CEO, Edwin Elias, said the mine would use the partnership to identify opportunities within its value chain whilst strengthening the capacity of existing and potential citizen suppliers.

“Through this partnership, CEDA brings its mandate for business advisory and financial support, and MCM brings its supply chain, its diversification agenda, and its practical understanding of what citizen enterprises need to compete,” Elias said.

He said the two institutions would work together to unlock opportunities in agribusiness, manufacturing and supplier development, whilst extending capacitation programmes to MCM suppliers.

Elias said MCM would also pursue joint venture funding mechanisms aimed at giving citizen companies access to long-term capital.

MCM has already increased citizen participation through its Citizen Entrepreneurship and Enterprise Development Programme (CEEP), which Elias said had directed more than P1 billion in cumulative expenditure towards citizen-owned enterprises since its inception.

According to MCM, citizen expenditure has increased from 29% to 53% of its procurement base, sustaining approximately 2,550 jobs.

The mine also plans to strengthen its accountability mechanisms, including the Beneficiation and Citizen Empowerment Performance Report and the Citizen Economic Empowerment Supplier Performance Dashboard, to track progress in citizen participation.

For CEDA, the partnership represents an opportunity to connect its financing and business development mandate to real market opportunities.

The CEDA CEO, Khalala Mokefane, said the agency would use the partnership to identify strategic initiatives and funding opportunities capable of increasing citizen participation and productive capacity in mining, economic diversification industries and other government priority sectors.

Mokefane said CEDA and MCM would provide entrepreneurial and supplier capacitation programmes, whilst CEDA would offer appropriate funding solutions to qualifying citizen enterprises.

The financing would include working capital and long-term funding to help businesses overcome some of the financial barriers associated with participating in the mining value chain.

The partnership will not be limited to mining, with CEDA also identifying opportunities in agribusiness, manufacturing, outsourced services and other diversification areas.

Of particular interest is a proposed collaboration to develop a cluster vegetable farm aimed at creating opportunities for young entrepreneurs in primary production and agro-processing.

The CEDA CEO said agriculture remained an important area of intervention for the agency, with increasing emphasis on connecting financing to production, aggregation, processing and, importantly, reliable markets.

'We have the new Letsema Horticultural Market in which we have identified Palapye as a collection centre. “We also have the poultry suit, which CEDA already has investments in the processing but needs throughput and offtake which, together with this partnership, can create market access. “The partnership could therefore provide market access while creating opportunities for entrepreneurs across the agricultural value chain,' he said.