OREFILE MMOPE ~ THE UNKNOWN ENTREPRENEUR
Orefile Mmope~A small business owner with big dreams
 |
| THE UNKNOWN ENTREPRENEUR |
He is a young Entrepreneur from the Royal Bafokeng Village, he refers to himself as the "Unknown Entrepreneur" his name is Orefile Mmope (22) and he shares with us his journey as a young Entrepreneur.
Orefile completed his High School studies at Bersig Academy and furthered his studies with CTU Training Solutions where he completed his Project Management Course. As young as he is he chose to pursue his career in business, given the economic challenges that we are currently facing as young people with the high rate of unemployment he saw a gap in the market and took a huge risk to start his own small business.
His love for business started in High School even though he was doing Science related subjects, his love for business kept on pushing him to pursue business regardless of his field of study. He relates in his story that his inspiration derives mainly from his surroundings growing up in the village and being exposed to the Kasi lifestyle, sparked his passion to do more for himself and use the resources at his disposal to kick-start his business.
Orefile Started his business Phoka Africa which is a digital tourism company which he runs as a Kasi Tour Advisor. Their vision as a company is to build a go to tool for village/township tourism that will expose the various tourism spaces for tourists and create a safe space for tourists and attract more visitors across the world. We often think that Tourism is exclusively for suburban areas forgetting our beautiful village landscapes, the kasi culture and lifestyle.
Phoka Africa brings diversity in the tourism sector, they provide a kasi/village experience to tourists not only through cultural tourist sites but also introducing the different dishes from African Cuisine to the Kasi Flavor. The company is still in its early phase and funding is a great challenge like in most small businesses. Orefile has not given up despite the financial challenges he is currently facing especially now with our current state of the global pandemic.
The lock-down affected his business drastically, the tourism sector was closed for over 3 months and it is only now that levels have gone down and the economy is gradually opening up even though the recovery will take a great amount of time to fully recover. This required Orefile and his team to think hard as to how they will recover as a company and find new innovative ideas to help them sustain the company. He was then introduced to Carpentry where he joined a workshop in Lefaragatlhe and learnt the skills of carpentry.
We are living in an era that requires skills to help you sustain yourself and your business, this is exactly what this young person did for himself and his business. He became a self taught carpenter which is now a consistent business that is now helping him to raise more funds for Phoka Africa. He didn't wait to receive funding instead he saw an opportunity and grabbed it with both arms and its now sustaining him and his business at the same time.
No one is coming to save you black child, you need to get up and use what is at your disposal in order to live your dream as a reality, because a dream is merely a dream unless you take action in order for it to materialize in its fullest form. Orefile didn't wait to be rescued as young as he is he fought his way and went looking for an opportunity that will eventually fund his business. He is now able to make make passive income even in the midst of the pandemic, he acquired a skill that will sustain him for life while he works on growing his business.
Socially he is part of an NGO called Aluta Foundation under their subdivision Entrepreneurship development. The NGO helps in assisting rural communities in accessing relevant information with regards to education, Entrepreneurship and career guidance. He is also working on a literature project "Books on Wheels" which is a mobile library to help encourage young people to read and to reach disadvantaged remote areas to gain access to reading material.
In conclusion Black child your dreams are valid and the power lies within you and in order to produce great results you need to start and put in the work and gradually work your way up. remember that you are a brand and you need to invest in yourself to grow beyond what you can imagine. We applaud young people like Orefile who took a risk and ran with his idea and creating other means to sustain his vision.
For more on what Orefile is currently doing you can follow him on all his social media platforms and let us continue to support each other as we grow to be better people in our society.
Comments
Post a Comment