Youth businesses get shot in the arm
Pauline Dikuelo | Wednesday September 16, 2015 18:00
In a bid to promote youth entrepreneurship among young people and reduce unemployment, from September 21, the youth will be able to register their businesses to access government contracts in half the time and at half the price. Company registration will be done in 14 days compared to the normal 30 days. The initiative, which targets young businesspeople between ages of 18 and 35, seeks to encourage young people to play an active role in the economy and actively participate in public procurement and asset disposal.
In an interview with Mmegi Business, the Minister of Youth Sport and Culture, Thapelo Olopeng said the initiative will help cut costs for youth businesses because he realised that they usually part ways with a lot of money during the PPADB registration and tendering process.
“The turnaround time was also not effective, so I requested that it should be put into consideration as mostly youth could not afford the P5000.00 charge,” he said. “We are pleased the PPADB took this into consideration and worked out their system to accommodate the youth.”
Olopeng said about 15 percent of government tenders have been reserved for the youth. From April to date, the ministry has allocated P1.7 million to youth businesses.
“I am not going to stop just at government level,” he added. “From here I will continue approaching different parastatal and the private sector to find ways on how they can work together with the youth businesses.”
For one to go through this process, they should have company registration documents in order, comply with contractor registration requirements and can submit them online to avoid delays associated with deferrals.
A press release from PPADB says the organisation shall process the 100 percent citizen owned youth contractors’ applications for registration within 14 days if they do not require inspection in line with the directive.
The 100 percent youth owned companies’ application submission fee shall remain at P100.00 and will pay 50 percent per sub code applied for in the discipline of works, services and supplies.
“The P5, 000.00 express application submission fee shall still apply for this service if a youth owned company needs registration to be done within shorter timelines of between two to four days,” the statement reads. “Express remains an option for contractors who get to see floating tenders late, and need urgent registration to participate in such tenders.”
PPADB is also working on reducing lead times for contractor registration for all applications by the end of the 2015/16 financial year.
The Minister of Finance and development Planning, Kenneth Matambo said in a budget speech last February that the amended Citizen Economic Empowerment Policy makes it mandatory for sub-contracting of government funded projects to 100 percent citizen owned companies.
It further stipulates that 30 percent of each ministry’s projects budget should be reserved for 100 percent citizen owned companies to promote citizen empowerment.