BITC organise historic virtual Global Expo
Botswana Investment and Trade Centre ( BITC) this week organised the first- ever international virtual Global Expo in a bid to remain relevant in the COVID- 19- induced New Normal.
Botswana Guardian visited Global Expo venue and spoke to BITC Chief Operations Officer Reginald Selelo to unpack the weekly events.
BITC’s role in promoting Foreign Direct Investment includes luring investors to Botswana, raising global awareness in the country and assisting in terms of building exports from Botswana to the rest of the economy.
As part of their new strategic shift, Selelo said they have increased their digital participation or “digital upgrade” through holding of several webinars with several countries such as Poland, Germany and South Africa. They also held virtual trade promotion missions to Zambia and Zimbabwe, which are traditionally conducted physically. In Zambia over 80 local companies participated in the week- long mission, which exposed them to potential partners and buyers of their products. Seeing the results of the virtual trade missions, BITC decided to do a virtual Global Expo. The Globalexpo’s highlight according to Selelo was the launch of the exhibition platform by President Dr. Mokgweetsi Masisi. Over 117 local and international companies showcased their goods and services in the virtual exhibition halls. The platform was developed by a team of young tech wiz Batswana in their mid 20’ s. BITC partnered with the two companies named 52 Sundays and Six dots. Selelo said the biggest thing out of the platform is PushaBW campaign, which informed their decision to engage youths since this is the first time they are doing it for their country. He said the opportunity opened possibilities for them to develop a similar system for other countries and network. The expo’s Trade Investment Conference had two sessions being building a resilient and self- sufficient economy post COVID- 19. The main speaker here was AfDB Vice President Solomon Quaynor. It was moderated by Moatlhodi Sebabole, chairperson of the National Transformation team and Minister of Investment and Trade, Peggy Serame, Assistant Minister of Agriculture Food and Security Beauty Manake, Delloite& Touché Managing
Director Emerging Markets in Africa Dr. Martyn Davies and CEO of Botswana Stock Exchange, Thapelo Tsheole. Quaynor gave a perspective from the rest of the world looking at what AfDB is doing in supporting countries like Botswana to build resilience. Selelo said the other session running concurrently was a panel discussion led by Morupule coal mine on the downstream coal beneficiation opportunities and alternative uses of coal. “Botswana has got 212 billion tonnes of coal but the question is how do we take advantage of the coal and maximise opportunities by doing coal to liquid? “Experts on the field were brought in from across the world such as Professor Paul Agachi from Romania based at BIUST and Kewame Gwandu,” he said.
An online seminar dubbed ‘ Empower Africa Business Forum’ and led by Israelis, discussed technology and agriculture by interrogating how network technology can shape the future of agriculture. It featured Ezi Rapaport, who is ranked among Israel’s richest people. A virtual investment battlefield where youths could pitch their great ideas to Angel investors to determine their investment potential also formed part of the globalexpo.