Entrepreneurship the key

LACK OF NATURAL RESOURCES IS A CHALLENGE BUSINESSES CAN EFFECTIVELY ADDRESS Entrepreneurs must seek solutions for the present and the future.

Addressing the lack of natural resources is widely reported as a worldwide economic priority. Kobus Engelbrecht, spokesperson for the 2018 Entrepreneur of the Year® competition sponsored by Sanlam and BUSINESS/PARTNERS says entrepreneurship is the remedy, explaining the driving force of all entrepreneurship is consumer need.

“All discovery, invention and innovation as well as the commercialisation thereof – from Einstein’s understanding of gravity to Edison’s light bulb and Job’s Macintosh – has responded to one human need or another,” he says.

With depleting natural resources across the globe, he explains we are at another point in time where innovation and entrepreneurship are needed to provide solutions for critical issues.

Engelbrecht refers to issues such as the global climate change and, locally, Cape Town’s water crisis: “While the drought has been most hard felt in the Western Cape, these negative circumstances provide an opportunity for all South African entrepreneurs to create products and services that respond to rising needs which will ultimately impact us all.”

He advises entrepreneurs to widely interrogate consumer needs related to the lack of natural resources to ensure that they are not operating in saturated industries when there could be demand elsewhere – perhaps with a different, diminishing resource.

For example, Engelbrecht explains how the worldwide bee population decline and the subsequent impact on fauna and flora has created an opportunity for entrepreneurs to respond with products such as Walmart’s pollination drones (or “robo bees”) that assist with pollination.

“The sustainability of our natural resources should be a top priority for everyone, so we should be encouraging entrepreneurs to take advantage of opportunities to create products and services that maintain the world ecosystem.

“Truly innovative entrepreneurship seeks to respond not only to the problems of the present, but also to the challenges of the future,” he says, referring to opportunities that lie in addressing new-age consumer needs.

These include the need for alternative electricity and energy sources like wind and solar or water-saving products and services, more efficient fuel resources and eco-friendly marine and farming solutions.