GROW your Business is designed to improve the skills of informal traders, making them better, more successful business people.

FOR Phanuel Monye, a 24-year-old informal trader from Brixton, in western Jozi, a little encouragement will act as a springboard to making his business a success.

Mayoral committee member for for finance, strategy and economic development, Parks Tau, welcomes traders to the Grow Your Business course (Photo: Enoch Lehung, City of Johannesburg)

Monye is one of 225 informal traders who gathered in Senate House at the University of the Witwatersrand in Braamfontein, for the second Grow Your Business programme on Saturday, 11 February.

"I expect [the course] to help me manage my cash flow. I want to keep up my business, not for it to go up and down," Monye says.

Like Monye, many came with the hope of improving their business. For eight weekends, they will learn how to run their businesses and handle their money. The programme was made possible by a partnership between the City of Johannesburg and Wits University's Curriculum Development Project (CDP). The City sponsors the programme and tuition is free.

The programme aims to give advice and support to small businesses, according to the CDP's project leader, Lettie Miles. "This is in compliance with the health and welfare requirements."

For the university's project manager, Adriaan Estebeth, the intention is to teach traders general business skills. He points out that there are also efforts under way to attract other stakeholders to take part in an exhibition day.

"The objective [of the exhibits] is to link the traders with businesses outside. However, last year was a disaster - only two came," Estebeth says about the stakeholders' interest in the informal trade industry.

Traders attending the Grow Your Business course at Wits University (Photo: Enoch Lehung, City of Johannesburg)

During the programme, the traders are split into separate classes and are lectured by Wits University business students. During the course, the university's intellectual property commercialisation company, Wits Enterprise, monitors the traders.

With so many small businesses in Johannesburg, the traders are selected to take part through the Gauteng economic development database, and "are chosen randomly", says Norman Mashego, the programme facilitator. They are notified by telephone or SMS to attend.

There are two sectors in the informal trade industry, he explains: the first includes those who ply their trade on the streets, in the demarcated areas where informal trading is allowed; the second are those who run crèches and pre-schools.

"We train them in business management. Some of them were unemployed and then decided to open up schools. Now they cannot run their finances," Mashego says. "They just take in children without running the school properly."

Parks Tau, member of the mayoral committee for finance, strategy and economic development, welcomed the traders on the first Saturday of the course, saying that only through a partnership between the City and the traders, could both overcome their challenges.

He stressed that "the most important partners in the partnership are the traders themselves".

Professor Patrick Fitzgerald, dean of the university's commerce, law and management faculty, also welcomed the traders. "This is adult learning, you learn from us, we learn from you," he said. "That is how we can raise the quality of life."

Many travelled from as far as Diepsloot to attend the session in Braamfontein. Honey Xaba, 39, sells food from a caravan in Kliptown. Her business, Honey's Fast Foods, started in 1999 but it has been slow lately.

"I want to know more than I know," Xaba says. Explaining her reasons for attending the course, she says she is motivated to improve her business skills because "I do not have a husband and I have two children to support".

A certificate of attendance will be awarded to those who completed the course; some voluntarily repeat the programme, as they may not understand the theory.

"I keep trying hard," Monye says. "I keep thinking of new ideas, thinking of ways to make money. I was distributing energy drinks. Now I want to sell cleaning chemicals."

Such a drastic change in his business path will need some help, and the Grow Your Business programme could offer him direction. "It takes time to grow a business; you need patience," he adds.