What a year it was in 2020 but now for 2021

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As you have seen much of our programme had to be put on hold due to travel restrictions imposed by COVID-19. But our work has continued behind the scenes and we are really hopeful for 2021. We are delighted to announce that we have now received funding for our primary training and support programme from UK Aid from the UK Government. This funding is for two years and will see us progress our programme in line with Stage 2 of our strategic plan. We have also received a grant from Saint James Place Foundation specifically to address some of the extra expenses which will occur due to running the programme during the COVID pandemic.

So what does this mean? Well… We have set up BE REEL as a charity in the Gambia, we are setting up our new office space on the Red Road in Kajabang, Gunjur and we have employed our first two members of staff. Our Programme Manager (Buba) and Project Officer (Lamin) will be visiting all our past participants to see how their businesses have been affected during the COVID period. With this information they, and us in the UK, will be putting together the training and support programme to take us forward.

We still can’t fly to the Gambia, but that will change soon so it will not be long now before our postponed workshops can get back on track. Meantime we will be using other means of digital communication to enhance training opportunities.

Nikki & Trevor

Workshop Postponed

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After a day of much thought both ourselves at BE REEL and our logistics partners Gunjur Project Association have decided that it is best to postpone our forthcoming workshop. Whilst we do not want to do this, we feel it is in the best interests of everyone not to hold a gathering of 30+ participants for five days whilst the threat of Covid-19 is so high. Whilst The Gambia has not yet had any reported cases, people are starting to be concerned locally and we feel this is a sensible precautionary measure. This is further exacerbated by the UK government today issuing advice to cancel all but essential travel and we feel it is not only prudent, but also a matter of common sense to follow this advice.

But this is just a postponement of the workshop and we will run it at as early a date as we possibly and sensibly can…

Workshop 5 - its nearly here

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The time has come again and we are preparing for our trip to Gunjur next week for the running of workshop 5. Amazing!! Gunjur Project Association have a new training hub which we might use… but we are told the weather is unseasonably hot at the moment so we might prefer to be in the open air to catch the odd breeze.

We have been fine tuning our workshop content as we work towards being able to have materials ready for train the trainer training as well. And of course after the last workshop, as with all of them, we try to tweak all aspects to make improvements where we can. So it has been quite busy between now and the last workshop.

One of our problems is always that we struggle to get high quality printing done in situ but taking the printed materials is very heavy on the luggage allowance! Still if that is our biggest problem, that is perfectly manageable.

Facilitators Buba and Lamin have been working hard with GPA to drum up applicants from a wide spread representation of the community - great work guys.

So final arrangements over the next week then back to sunny Gunjur…

Final Day and Celebration

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After a morning of hard work on the individual outline business plans the participants attended a celebration and certificate presentation. We were honoured by local dignitaries attending (British and Gambian) and a local kora player to entertain us.

After the certificate presentation the participants had prepared a surprise presentation in the form of a play which they performed

ACT ONE: The story started with an announcement on Gunjur radio of one of the workshop participants - Ami, advertising her poultry business. Then another woman - Manyima, lamenting that her poultry business was not succeeding and this must be because the successful woman Ami had used witchcraft. A friend tried to persuade Manyima otherwise and took her to see Ami whose staff talked to her about how Ami’s chickens were now better than the competition and that she had attended the BE REEL business training first and that this was the reason for her success. The staff persuaded Manyima that if she did the training her business would improve too.

ACT TWO: A man - Fabakary, was staggering around the stage rather the worse for a few drinks and lamenting that there was nothing left for him in Africa. He thought his only option now was to ‘take the backway’ to enter Europe illegally. Again a friend suggests that he goes to visit Ami. This time we meet Ami who tells the story of how she started her business by buying 50 chickens but 25 died because she did not have the technical skills to rear chickens and then the business also failed because she did not have the management skills to save it. She too had been distraught and thought that she could not succeed. But she had been told about the BE REEL training and had applied - successfully. After the training she realised that she needed to learn the technical skills and had been given the management skills to run the business. She then started the business very small and grown it by managing all aspects and now had a successful business employing 50 people. She persuaded Fabakary to change his attitude and apply for the training as Africa had more to offer him than taking the backway, where he would surely be returned home as an illegal.

The acting was superb and the sentiments were well received by the audience. After the performance we had lunch before everyone departed for the day. Before the participants left Trevor and I were presented with a gift from Ami’s poultry farm (still a micro-business at the moment of course) - a live chicken!

Day Four

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Well you might ask what happened to day three… Well it went ahead with Trevor taking the whole day whilst I remained in our room too unwell to leave it!! But 24 hours later, all is well and I was back with Trevor.

Yesterday they did some fantastic work on creating Logos and started thinking about who their customers are and how to advertise to them. I have been trying to learn how to put photos with the blog… I am not succeeding very well… but I shall try something else today but if they don’t appear there are loads more photos on the facebook page @buildingempowerment.

Today, more work on finances and how to work out your pricing as well more work on keeping your financial records. The business ideas they have had and written on trees are now growing leaves as we cover more topics to help them make their businesses flourish.

Daddy hair salon.JPG

Kady’s Salon

Papis phone sales.JPG

Papis’s phone shop

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Dawda’s logo

Dawda makes and sells yoghurt products

Interview day

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We have arrived. In fact we arrived two days ago but there has been no internet coverage in Gunjur so we have been unable to post any updates. But the internet is back and we are in business.

We arrived Tuesday late afternoon to a warm welcome from the people at Gunjur Project and generally just collapsed after eating due to the 4am start from home. So yesterday was our first ‘working’ day. We looked at the application forms - 43 of them, and realised that the maximum we would be able to take on this workshop was 30. A further application form arrived later so now - how to whittle them down to 30? Whilst thinking about this we set off into the village to do our courtesy calls. First up we saw the Alkalo (mayor) of Kajabang, the part of Gunjur where the programme is run. Then on to see the Imam who was on good form - no one knows his exact age but it is somewhere in excess of 90. Then on to see Nansymba (the leading lady in the village) who was unwell so we saw her daughter, and finally on to see the Alkalo of Gunjur itself, and many of his committee of Alkalos. We had some great conversations about what is happening in the village with each of them and also about how the programme is progressing. The tribal chief was to be our other call but he was working and so we arranged to see him on Friday (tomorrow). Whilst in the village we ran into several past participants of the programme and it was good to catch up on how their businesses were doing.

So today… we have interviewed, starting at 9.30 this morning, finishing after 5pm, speaking with all the candidates. A great bunch of people with huge enthusiasm. Some already have their businesses up and running but want to grow their businesses; others still want to start. We decided that we would take all those that met the selection criteria and we would have to offer a second workshop, early in the New Year. We had planned to do another workshop then, but we did not realise that we would half fill it on this trip!

Really good to be working with Buba and Lamin again as our facilitators who continue to work tirelessly with us.

Two days of logistics coming up for us before the workshop starts on Sunday.

Workshop 4 starts next week

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Trevor and I are really excited that we are off to Gunjur again next week for our fourth micro-business training event. Lots to do before we get there - Finalising the updated programme content, getting all the materials together, packing … And in Gambia our wonderful facilitators, Buba and Lamin are collecting the final applications for and Gunjur Project Association are making sure that the logistics for the workshop are all in place. So busy week and looking forward to arriving on Tuesday 19th.