Thandiwe chases top national award

 

July 07, 2008

Zululand OBSERVER

	Thandiwe chases top national award Finalist Thandiwe Mfekayi who was nominated with Simangele Cele for the Shoprite Checkers/SABC2 Woman of the Year Award* MTUBATUBA is home to one inspiring finalist in the national 2008 Shoprite Checkers/SABC2 Woman of the Year Award in the business entrepreneurs category. The finalist is Thandiwe Mfekayi who was nominated with Simangele Cele. They are the owners and managers of Memory Nyalazi Harvest cc, a company which specialises in forestry harvesting, supplying fell timber to the two multi-national paper companies Sappi and Mondi. It is truly a path-finding company which is 100% owned by these two women in an industry dominated by men. Since starting their business in 2001 they have grown rapidly - initially delivering 2 500 tons of fell timber per month and now 16 000 tons per month. Turnover shot from R1.3-million back then to R3.5-million today. The company employs 265 people, of which 80% are women and five of the eight supervisory positions are held by women. It is a company which has earned respect for their labour relations in the forestry industry. Their wages for staff is 10% above the minimum wage for forestry workers and they transport workers free of charge to their work in rural areas where there is no transport. Without this transport many of these workers would have remained unemployed or would have had to leave their children at home to stay in compounds. Tough road As it was a difficult entity to start, none of the banks considered to help them financially. Purchasing tools, procuring vehicles and other contingencies such as the necessary protective clothing and chainsaws was a great challenge and they had to fund it out of their own pockets. They also experienced a lot of resistance in managing men who were just not prepared to accept women 'bosses' in this industry. A big breakthrough came when they managed to move from being subcontractors to become main contractors after securing their own contracts with corporate growers, Sappi Forest in 2005 and Mondi Paper recently.