While in high school, Christelle Ishimwe met a friend with whom they shared business ambitions and together they commenced the execution of a business idea that had been in incubation since childhood dubbed Nish. At the time, as a small girl, she said she always had an interest in fashion design, where she made clothes for the whole dancing crew she belonged to at a young age. Ishimwe is co-owner of NISH LTD, a fashion brand that focuses on products that bring joy to families like kids wear and accessories for expecting mothers, while also creating jobs for women. She is one of 24 entrepreneurs who on Friday, November 12, graduated from a six months innovative incubator programme dubbed Tourism Inc implemented by Entrepreneurial Solutions Partners (ESP), a global management consulting firm and Mastercard Foundation offering technical and financial support to entrepreneurs. The participating firms are involved in a wide range of activities including adventure tourism, fashion, lifestyle, culinary tourism among others. This was the initiative’s fourth cohort of graduates bringing the total number of graduates from the program to over 100. The incubator among other things seeks to create a learning ecosystem with a combination of technical assistance and financing ideal for upcoming entrepreneurs to support business growth and job creation. Ishimwe said that from the program, she gained skills that she is going to use to shape her business by improving the quality of her products. She is also one of a few graduates that were given financial grants to uplift their business, and from that money, she said that she will use it mainly in marketing her products and training employees. Sharon Akanyana, another entrepreneur who runs ISHYO FOODS which produces high-quality food products such as jam and dairy products, said that the program was very helpful in providing awareness on how they can manage the company’s assets without using them for other personal purposes. In addition, she said that one of the most supportive skills she got from the initiative was balancing mental health with business life, and called fellow emerging entrepreneurs to follow their ambitions. Nima Yussuf, a Senior Project Manager at ESP, said that the focus on women in the program is to encourage young female entrepreneurs to start their own businesses, and by comparing to the first cohort, there is progress in female representation. Yussuf said that ESP provides technical assistance which is a mix of workshops, inspiring talks and coaching programs. “Recently one of our cohort three graduates won funding from Google. This shows how this programme helps entrepreneurs by opening other connections for them,” she said. Rica Rwigamba the Country Head at Mastercard Foundation said that Mastercard’s Hanga Ahazaza aims at supporting more than 30,000 youth to get jobs by 2023. By having more than 100 entrepreneur’s graduate from this initiative, Rwigamba is progressing towards the goal. She added that after graduating, Mastercard Foundation follows up on entrepreneurs and keeps assisting them where necessary. Samuel Karangwa, co-founder of Punda Group which connects service providers said that from the financial grant he got from this initiative, he is going to take his business to another level, by making their services digital and developing an application that will ease their work. Eric Kacou, the Co-founder and Chief Executive of Entrepreneurial Solutions advised entrepreneurs to keep working together to collaborate after graduation because working as a team is something that pushes different businesses to succeed. Since the establishment of the initiative, 107 have graduated since the first cohort, 168 jobs were created, 110 supported of which 67 per cent is women and 192 products and services have also been improved as a result of the initiative.
