Organized by: Supported by:

1st Tanzania Social Entrepreneurship Forum

on: The role of social enterprises in Tanzania

social-economic development.

Post Forum Report KINU, 1st floor Conservation house, Dar es Salaam Tanzania

January, 16th 2015

www.truemaisha.com

“Social Entrepreneurship is not only teaching people how to fish but also

revolutionizing the whole fishing industry”

Bill Dryton the founder of Ashoka

The first Tanzania Social Entrepreneurship Forum on the role of social enterprises in Tanzania Social –

Economic development closed up with a total of 35 participants. The forum was hosted and organized by

TrueMaisha Training Company Limited and got its support from various stakeholders such as Reach for

Change Tanzania who contributed more on leveraging its importance in the context of Tanzania, KINU a

capacity building & co creation center offered a venue and all event facilities, Plan B. Solutions a media and

communication company from Dar es salaam offered the event documentation and Apps & Girls an NGO

empowering girls on Information Technology from Dar es salaam facilitated the whole networking session.

The forum managed to gather participants from Dar es Salaam and few from Arusha region, 95% were from

local and international Non- Government Organizations and the remaining 5 % involved people from

government institutions, corporate companies and individuals who are not affiliated to any organization.

The forum program featured inputs from three main speakers who are experts in social entrepreneurship

and social entrepreneurs from Tanzania; Richard Gorvett the Country Manager of Reach for Change Tanzania

as an expert on social entrepreneurship while Oyite Tungaraja the managing director of Voice Giving Dar es

salaam and Innocent James the Director of My little travelling library from Mwanza Tanzania were social

entrepreneurs to share their experiences.

Apart from that the representatives from different participating organizations were highly contributing

insights as per their organizations’ mission and their personal experiences around the forum main theme

which enriched the learning process out of the event.

Bringing together social entrepreneurship experts and stakeholders from different organizations created a

good platform for networking and empowering each other through sharing, challenging each other which

resulted to learning for future development.

THE EVENT

COMMENT:

“The event is good and a platform for learning and sharing ideas plus knowledge. It motivates much for I have

learnt many things that I was not aware of or shallow in them.”

Participant .

FORUM PROGRAM

The main forum agenda had been formulated by TrueMaisha Training

Company Limited under the section of Social entrepreneurship training

team with the main goal of advocating for social entrepreneurship sector

recognition in Tanzania. The program was made of three sessions i.e.

speakers presentations, plenary discussion and networking. However the

presentation session was made up of four subtopics out of the main theme

which was; “The role of social enterprises on Tanzania social economic

development.”

The 1st Tanzania social entrepreneurship forum took almost 4 hours from

16.00pm to 19.00pm to its closure whereas networking was the closing

session.

Chaired by Erick Chrispin the founder of Tanzania Social Entrepreneurship

Forum (TASEF) 2012 (as an online platform to discuss social

entrepreneurship issues in Tanzania), and the Managing Director of

TrueMaisha Training Co. Limited which is the forum host for 2015 opened

the door for this first live forum to be held in Tanzania. The collaboration of

other partners in Development: Reach for Change Tanzania, KINU, Apps &

Girls, Plan B Solutions, Business Licensing and Registration Agency (BRELA)

and all participating organizations made a full representation of Tanzania

Government, corporate world and private social development sector in the

event program.

The event has significantly opened the door for many participated social

development stakeholders to think of using this forum to communicate

their mission for change to the public, beneficieries and decision makers in

Tanzania. It has also leveraged the creativity opportunity to the stakeholders

come up with more initiatives which will empower social innovators and

change makers in Tanzania.

“Having participants from different field and backgrounds has been

enriching a lot especially during discussion and networking sessions”

Participant.

“The speakers presentations were more of testimonies which real works

in motivating and challenging people. They well managed their time.”

Participant .

COMMENTS

PLENARY SESSIONS

The positive tone of the first Tanzania Social Entrepreneurship Forum in Dar es

Salaam was set at the plenary on Friday, January 16, moderated by Cuthbert

Fungo the Managing Director of CCDI Dar es Salaam, the welcome address was

made by Erick Chrispin the founder of TASEF and managing Director of

TrueMaisha Training Company Limited (the forum host). Erick started by

appreciating everyone for showing up before presenting the forum objectives

that its aim is to advocate for social entrepreneurship approach in Tanzania so

as to create conducive environment for social entrepreneurs to successfully

work and establish more initiatives to influence social economic development

in the country. He later on opened the forum officially.

Richard Gorvett the country manager of Reach for Change Tanzania was the

first astounding speaker who came in to present the concept of social

entrepreneurship, its meaning and the role of social entrepreneur in general.

He defined social entrepreneurship by focusing on a social entrepreneur who is

a person that creates startup to solve social problems. He used Reach for

change beneficiaries as an example of existing social entrepreneurs who impact

change in Tanzania. He couldn’t wait to share the mission of Reach for Change

Tanzania which is to improve the lives of children and youth through investing

in and developing exciting social ventures run by high potential social

entrepreneurs.

Oyite Tungaraja the Co-founder and Director of Voice Giving Tanzania took

over and had an inspiring presentation on launching a social enterprise in the

context of Tanzania. In his presentation as a social entrepreneur he used Voice

Giving as a case to portray the motion. Oyite made it open that though social

entrepreneurs are still not recognized formally in Tanzania but there is

possibility to start a social enterprise and gain support from government and

other stakeholders within. He strengthened the point of social entrepreneurs

from Tanzania leveraging their creativity level for them to successfully launch a

social enterprise in Tanzania. He used an example of Voice Giving which got

support from Ilala Municipal council after recognizing the impact of their bus

stop cleaning project in Dar es Salaam.

It was Innocent James the founder and managing Director of My Little

Travelling Library from Mwanza Tanzania who closed the first session by

astonishingly presenting on starting up a social enterprise/business without

financial capital. He also used My Little Travelling Library as an example to

clarify this. He strengthened the importance of making sure as a startup social

entrepreneur one must start by creating a minimal product of any size which

will attract customers and funds that will in return offer capital to grow your

startup venture. So for him it starts with product before even having financial

capital.

PARALLEL SESSIONS

The agenda was organized around the main theme (The role of

social enterprises in Tanzania Social-Economic Development).

Apart from networking session, there were hot discussions

through questions and answers around the following topics:

Social entrepreneurship meaning and the role of the social

entrepreneur.

Launching a social enterprise/business in Tanzania context.

Legal frameworks for social enterprise/business in

Tanzania.

Starting up a social enterprise/business without financial

capital.

TrueMaisha Training Co. Limited.

COMMENTS:

The event was very good, it gave an opportunity for people to understand what is social entrepreneurship, how

to become a successful social entrepreneur and promoting people to become social entrepreneurs.

Participant________________________________________________________________________________

Tanzania Social Entrepreneurship forum is a great idea to be developed in Tanzania, let us have more of these

events for it is very innovative and it encourages innovation.

Participant________________________________________________________________________________

The forum is very enriching, the networking session specifically has been fruitful to me for I managed to meet

people whom we are going to start a project together right from here. This is a brilliant platform to be sustained.

Participant________________________________________________________________________________

The forum has been of great success at the beginning, we need to join power to make it happen every month,

we shall need to have a meeting with the organizing team so to discuss how we are going to work together in

organizing these forums in future.

Participant ________________________________________________________________________________

ORGANIZERS

Is a reliable human potential empowerment

training company that maximizes people’s

capacity to better transform their life and

organizations through motivational training and

coaching programs.

Urafiki Flats, Block E, No. 11, Ubungo

P. O. Box 13186

Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Tell: +255 (0) 653 808 032

Email: info@truemaisha.com

Website: www.truemaisha.com

1st Tanzania Social Entrepreneurship Forum

on: The role of social enterprises in Tanzania

social-economic development

Keep in touch for the

next forum!

www.truemaisha.com

Organized by: Supported by: