Research symposium harness Indian experience
The Research Council of Zimbabwe is next month set to hold the 11th Zimbabwe International Research Symposium at the Harare International Conference Centre (HICC) from 16 to 17 February. The Indian Embassy of Zimbabwe is one of the major partners of the event and has facilitated more than 30 experts from India to come and exchange notes with other participants at the symposium
Last week, our Chief Reporter Kuda Bwititi spoke to India Ambassador in Zimbabwe Rungsung Masakui on what India is bringing to the important event.
Below is what Ambassador Masakui said in the interview
THE Research Council of Zimbabwe invited us some months ago to find out if we would be interested to support and be part of this initiative. We have been closely interacting with the Ministry of SMEs here and we have many programmes that are coming such as the vocational training centre in the Waterfalls which is going to be functioning soon.
So within those discussions this idea of the seminar came up and the Research Council of Zimbabwe invited us to be a partner who could also bring in delegations from India to share their experience with Zimbabwe.
So I contacted the relevant authority in India, which is the National Small Industries Corporation (NSIC).
They agreed to send a delegation headed by the chairman of the NSIC to participate at the seminar.
The delegation that is coming is a high-powered one. It will have 33 people, 22 are in various manufacturing sectors in India. Some of these sectors include bottle manufacturing, hydraulic components, batter parts, printing, handicraft, food processing, baking, detergent producers, soya meal extraction and many others.
They are looking for opportunities for co-production in Zimbabwe.
So as you can see, these are simple technologies and there are potential areas of corporation where Zimbabwe can learn a lot
My job is to bring these business people together. So it is up to the companies to see what agreements they will strike together.
The seminar is therefore an important platform for these Indian companies to interact with Zimbabweans and possibly strike partnerships as well as learn the new expertise.
Before the seminar itself which takes place on the 16th and 17th of February, the Indian embassy is planning to host a business interactive meeting.
The idea is to bring the Indian manufacturers to interact with as many business people as possible so that they can explore ways of collaboration.
There are many other projects that the Indian Embassy is facilitating for Zimbabwe.
The NSIC sent equipment valued at about US$1 million for the vocational centre.
Initially, the site for the centre had not yet been identified but after we chose the place in Waterfalls, everything is now on course.
The training centre will be up and running this year.
We will have training of trainers then once that is done, the project will run.
The NSIC comes under the Ministry of Small and Medium Enterprises in India. It is a parastatal that deals with small industries.
They are also instrumental in setting up incubation centres. They have set up a number of such training centres in many countries in Asia and Africa.
So they have been doing this for long and now Zimbabwe is also set to benefit.
These are low technology projects that will bring a huge impact at the community level in terms of generating income and creating employment.
You can operate from home but start selling from there by just employing your brother or sister. If you look at the economy of Zimbabwe, a huge part of its activities are in the informal sector so your people stand to benefit immensely from these technologies.
Trade between Zimbabwe and India at the moment is not reflecting the sound political and bilateral ties that we enjoy. The trade figures were about US$220 million for last year and the figure is skewed in favour of India. There is much more potential to do better than this.
So as our targets for this year, we want to improve cooperation so we are targeting five sectors which are agriculture, health, mining sector, education, SMEs.
Just recently, we had the launch of the Pro-Aid in collaboration with NARANA health group which has come here targeting to set up hospitals here.
NARANA has around 30 hospitals in India.
We also have a group called Fortis, they have 60 hospitals in India and they are also looking to set up here.
While India also promotes its health tourism, it is in the spirit of promoting South-South cooperation that we also seek to transfer such expertise here.
Because I am Ambassador here, Zimbabwe is strategically located to become a potential health hub for the region.
You have so many people going to India but if these partnerships bear fruit, the facilities which are in India can also be made available here.
In education, we are looking at Medicare education and engineering education and working with universities so that there can be technical collaboration.
In terms of agriculture, we are also willing to cooperate because India is a hugely populated country and we are willing to import Zimbabwe’s farm produce, especially vegetables.
We can absorb any kind of production. There are good farms here.
The Pepsi Group is also looking for land to produce sugar cane and expand the investment that it has already made for its bottling plant.
The SMEs sector is a huge component of India’s economy.
It contributes nearly 40 percent to our GDP and the other 40 percent for our export and much as 45 percent for manufacturing.
In terms of research, I cannot say specifically what Zimbabwe can learn. However an important part of our economy has been our focus on rural economy.
We emphasise on building the rural areas and in that context we come up with technology that is appropriate and suited to the rural areas so as to generate more to economic development and reach out to a large number of people through the SMEs sector.
We have of course a higher and bigger industry in the bigger cities but the smaller technologies are less capital intensive.
So it is more about economic empowerment for people at the lower strata.
India is also a developing nation. What we have gone through is what Zimbabwe is going through.
But one thing that is clear is that Zimbabwe has been importing its necessities from neighbouring countries.
So if Statutory Instrument 64 is to be fully implemented, it is the smaller entrepreneurs that will benefit.
If we can be partners in that narrative of producing from small industries, we can go far.