The Technology, Research, Innovation for Business Education (TRIBE) has set a spotlight on the development of young Liberian entrepreneurs through a business startup program called the Idees Startup Incubator.
The capacity and business advancement organization TRIBE, along with its partner, Pacha Soap, based in the United States of America, developed the incubation process program for young business owners to advance and expand their business more professionally.
TRIBE believes small and medium-sized enterprises are the background or driving forces behind the structural changes that create opportunities for prosperity.
On Tuesday, December 19, 2023, the team at TRIBE, as part of its business ecosystem advancement plan, hosted the 2023 Entrepreneurship Symposium to discuss the sector in terms of growth, challenges, and problem-solving models. At the gathering, which was hosted at the Bella Casa Hotel in Monrovia, other stakeholders from different sectors were also invited to share ideas that link business to the rest of the ecosystem.
The Chief Executive Officer for TRIBE, Wainright Acquoi, explained that Liberian businesses are faced with many challenges that need the intervention of partners and other actors to shift the paradigm for the good of the entrepreneurship ecosystem.
According to Acquoi, problems, including the lack of access to financial assistance for young entrepreneurs, limited mentorship and training, as well as the limitation of innovative and infrastructural facilities to accommodate businesses, are situations that should be placed under a national business agenda for the growth of the Liberia business sector.
He said the Indees Startup Incubation implemented by his organization brought together young entrepreneurs for intensive trainings in both theoretical and practical application, as well as site-seeing, with the intention to mitigate the stats that local young Liberian entrepreneurs struggle with the setting up of a formal business structure, which impedes the raising of capitals for their ventures.
Under the theme “Improving startups’ growth and development in Liberia’s entrepreneurial ecosystem,” the Entrepreneurship Symposium created a platform for its first cohort of the Idee Startup incubators to sit on a panel to discuss the impact of startups on their personal development, businesses modeling, market validation, as well as understanding their post-incubation plan for further growth.
Other prominent national and international entrepreneurs who formed part of different panels gracing the occasion were Rory Donohoe, the Deputy Mission Director of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID); Mai Bright Urey, the Chief Executive Officer of CylMA holdings and Agro-processing Company, and longtime businessman, Taa Wongbe, Representative-elect of Electoral District 9, Nimba County.
Others are Chief Executive Officers, Marvin Tarawally, Luther Jake, and Mahmud Johnson, of Loop Academies, iCampus, and J-Palm Liberia respectively.
The young entrepreneurs under the Idees Startup Incubator expressed gladness for what they termed as intense knowledge building process for the Liberian business community, implemented by TRIBE, with support from Pacha Soap.
In different testimonies, the incubators explained the challenges faced by each of them at the start of their different business ventures, and the growth achieved from the incubation process, which taught them team building, leadership, and business branding, among others.
One of the beneficiaries of the program is Jared Lankah, the Chief Executive Officer of Nimba Ventures Inc., a youth-led agribusiness in Nimba County, who explained that his business, from all indications, will experience a major transformation as a result of the knowledge obtained from the program.
Jared said “It is a good thing for young enterprising Liberians to form a part of these kinds of programs, which actually build capacities and create avenues to becoming good in building their businesses with the best agendas. This incubation process was an amazing program teaching on structuring our various businesses to make more impact in the entrepreneurship ecosystem.”
Linda Seton of Eco Soap Liberia Inc., said, “As a beneficiary of this program, we are going to explore and make our institution great with lessons learned from these trainings. With the support that is also expected from TRIBE and partners, mainly Pacha Soap, we will get equipment that will take Eco Soap to the next level in the coming days.”
Other business tycoons disclosed that the entrepreneurship cycle is a space of having a positive comprehensive mindset, despite the risk of challenges that comes along the way.
The newly elected Representative of Nimba County District 9, Taa Wongbe, who has spent several years in the enterprising space, motivated young entrepreneurs with a story of engaging businesses of any kind with positive mindset, in order to have the sector meeting its expected outcomes
