After the World Labour Day and some reflection the Socio-economic Justice team of the MCOP of Choma took up the challenge to focus and raise a debate on the Zambian economic situation, whilst examining the local community on these grounds: unemployment, informal economy and the micro-economic sector. This article serves to demonstrate how the MCOP offers their SEJ-Training to the community.

Examining Choma’s residents we find that the majority of the population survive through the informal sector. This implies market- and street vendors, small tuck shop owners, backyard production (art-, iron-, and woodwork), services (cleaning, car wash and gardening) and small-scale farming. Since Choma remains a transit town for commercial farmers during seasonal crop harvest (mostly maize) and with a rapid growth of residential areas due to competitive prices and land availability, the inhabitants are force to create their own job opportunities. The perception of the economic sector by locals is adapt or perish.

The MCOP deals sensitively with the aspect of job creation and its condition. Its self-entrepreneurship program is one of the activities that falls directly under the SEJ-Training. The aim and objectives are to empower members of the community to understand economics and to facilitate in the process of business planning. From the pool of our participants we will now look into the cooperation with Mrs. Jane Hamwala and use this as our case study. This should give a small insight of small businesses run in our community. (Note: mostly women are involved in small businesses and contribute largely to the survival of the society in Choma)

Mrs. Hamwala is 50 years old and lives in a rented one bedroom house for 80,000 ZMK monthly (about € 14). This house has neither water nor electricity. She’s head of the family with her daughter and three grand children. All in all Mrs. Hamwala is an amazing woman and has a strong character of perseverance, friendly and loving. Therefore, it comes natural that everyone in the compound knows her as Mum Jane.

Mum Jane’s day starts at dawn around 5 o’clock leaving for the Makalanguzu market and returning to her own-build Zambian tuck shop, made out of wood, sacks and plastics, situated in front of her house. She sells basic needs commodity – such as soap, matches, sugar but in very small quantities – at a low price that cannot be beaten and has done this for five years.

This type of retail is very common in Zambia. Since people from very low income cannot afford a full bar of soap at a time, the bar gets downscaled into small pieces that are affordable. Research shows, that many households cannot afford more than 200 grams of sugar or salt, or 750 ml of cooking oil at a time. These Zambian tuck shops are called Kantemba – Nyanja for small grocery store – and are a relief for millions of households living below the poverty line in Zambia – 2008 estimates say 68% of Zambian population live below the national poverty line of 1,25 USD/day. These Kantembas allow for small-scale transactions – for instance 5 grams of salt – that are either bought in cash, on credit or in some cases through bartering own products for commodities – for instance using eggs, vegetables or chicken as medium of exchange. During winter Mum Jane’s tuck shop even sells wood charcoal, Paraffin and candles as energy and heating source.

Another business Mum Jane runs is her local bakery. Every Sunday afternoon she bakes 80 home made rolls – similar to scones – for her restaurant at Makalanguzu market. This restaurant is more like a small tea shop but for locals it’s commonly known as a restaurant. The MCOP was interested to follow the whole bakery process rolls, since this woman has build her own oven using her own bricks (a picture documentary is found in the gallery). The energy for the process is fire wood. Here and there Mum Jane has improved her business through proper management. Things that she proudly declares as an achievement in the learning process made possible by the MCOP SEJ-Training team.

By Patrick Mookeenah