ENTERPRISE BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT/ARTISAN PROGRAMME

Micro/small entrepreneurs are the backbone of Nigeria’s economy, accounting for employment and means of livelihood for majority of the population. However they remain the same size year after year rarely ever making profit or expanding in size. As part of ENDIPs objective to develop a pool of potential entrepreneurs who are well equipped to successfully manage micro enterprises, ENDIP has identified micro/small entrepreneurs and artisans. These entrepreneurs have been provided business development services and trainings on topics such as book keeping, customer relations and marketing. A workshop on “Promoting micro/small scale enterprises for sustainable growth & development of the private sector” was organized by ENDIP in August 2002. It had in attendance over 30 participants drawn from artisan groups, the National Association of Small Scale Industrialists (NASSI) and other governmental and non-governmental organizations.

 BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT & ADVISORY SUPPORT SERVICES FOR ABUA & EKPEYE KINGDOMS OF RIVERS STATE

Provision of professional, non-financial business development services is lacking in the Niger Delta region.  Desirous of economically empowering and improving the livelihoods of their host communities, ENDIP was contracted by NLNG to carry out a baseline survey to identify institutional gaps and training need analysis, gap inventory and organisational development.  A technical, entrepreneurship and micro-enterprise development training, mindset re-orientation project sponsored by Nigeria LNG Limited aimed at developing capacities of existing enterprises and promoting the growth of new enterprises commenced in October 2006.  The overarching objective of the two-year project was to fill identified gaps in business planning and management through planned on-the-field coaching, capacity building/training and support for micro-entrepreneurs in selected NLNG host communities of Abua and Ekpeye Kingdoms of Rivers State.  Business development & advisory support services project was implemented in 21 communities of Abua & Ekpeye Kingdoms, benefitting 84 community-based micro-entrepreneurs.  This project also involved the training and capacity building of key informants as community-based training of trainers programme and forward linkage of beneficiaries with external funding agencies and business development organisations.  84 micro-entrepreneurs were empowered with the establishment of 15 cooperative societies.