VZCZCXYZ0000
RR RUEHWEB

DE RUEHMB #0074/01 0551529
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 241529Z FEB 10
FM AMEMBASSY MBABANE
TO SECSTATE WASHDC 3938

UNCLAS MBABANE 000074 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR S/GWI; AF/S (MHARRIS) 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: KWMN PREL KPAO PHUM AID CDC COM TRSY WZ
SUBJECT: S/GWI PROJECT PROPOSALS - SWAZILAND 
 
REF: 09 STATE 132094 
 
¶1. In response to reftel, U.S. Embassy Mbabane appreciates the 
opportunity to submit four project proposals that seek to address 
the many challenges facing Swazi women.  The proposals are presented 
by priority order.  Post received over twenty proposals, and each 
one would greatly benefit the political, economic or social 
advancement of women.  Post hopes that the four proposals submitted 
will be considered favorably, and that if any additional funds 
become available, Swaziland will be considered.  If lesser funds are 
available for any of the projects, we would appreciate the 
opportunity to help the organization down-scale the project to meet 
the budget.  Thank you for an extension on this submission, and we 
will be happy to address any questions you may have. 
 
¶2.  The post's coordinator for the Ambassador's Self-Help Grants, 
Military, and Federal Assistance will have project and financial 
oversight responsibility for all approved projects.  Contact 
information: Vicky Mboka-Boyer, phone +(268) 404-6441 ext. 2016, or 
IVG +732-2016.  All nominated projects support the Mission's 
Strategic Plan.  A multi-office team evaluated the proposals to 
ensure that there was no overlap with other possible funding 
sources, such as PEPFAR or DRL, or regionally administered programs. 
 All three projects would provide needed resources to complement 
Mission efforts to achieve the goals it shares with S/GWI. 
 
¶3. Project #1 TechnoServe:  Capacitating and providing working 
capital to the Golden Women knitting business, to create 200 new 
jobs for Swazi women. 
 
¶A. PROBLEM STATEMENT 
 
Economic and business leadership opportunities for women in 
Swaziland are limited and lag significantly behind those available 
to men. In Swaziland, only 23.5 percent of women hold formal 
employment positions compared to 39.6 percent for men. It is a 
testament to the leadership skills of women that they hold 30.2 
percent of management and leadership positions in the private 
sector, but the number is declining (from 34.4 percent in 2000). 
Without a source of income, women often are not able to meet their 
basic living needs, provide for their families, educate their 
children, or make independent financial decisions.  Moreover, 
although handcrafts are a leading industry in Swaziland, none of the 
country's major handcrafts businesses (e.g., Gone Rural, Ngwenya 
Glass, Rosecraft, Swazi Candles, etc.) are owned by a black woman. 
 
The goal of the Golden Women knitting project is to address these 
problem areas.  It would assist a target group of poor women who 
have received some knitting and crochet training but have lost their 
jobs due to the relocation of the employer.  TechnoServe's goal is 
to provide the technical assistance, training, and working capital 
needed to expand the Golden Women knitting project as a means to 
making it a self-sustaining, Swazi-managed small industry. 
 
¶B. SUMMARY OF PROPOSED PROGRAM 
 
Golden Women is a woman-owned income generation business that has 
the potential to create 200+ fair-wage knitting and crochet jobs for 
Swazi women by the end of 2011. Twenty of these jobs would be 
leadership and management positions. 
 
The new jobs would empower women, who live primarily in rural areas, 
because it would provide them with income while enabling them to 
work from home, on their own schedules, and for the amount of hours 
they choose.  Women in leadership positions would act as "site 
leaders," earning a higher wage, leading and training a group of 
twenty women each, and managing the group's cotton supply and 
money. 
 
TechnoServe believes these goals are feasible and proposes to 
provide the assistance Golden Women needs to achieve them.  Proposed 
activities include:  employing a TechnoServe resource to act as the 
Golden Women business manager, develop business processes, and 
coordinate growth of the business; identifying and training a 
permanent business manager; coordinating training for knitters and 
site leaders; developing and implementing a sales and marketing 
strategy to grow the business's customer base; and passing on seed 
working capital to pay for initial increases in cotton costs. 
 
Golden Women intends to be a self-sustaining business by the end of 
¶2011. Its ambition is to invest its profits and use its business 
skills to continue to grow after that point. Indeed, a similar 
business operated in Zimbabwe for 15 years and employed about 5,000 
women at its peak.  Golden Women's long-term aspiration is to 
operate on that scale. 
 
¶C. PROJECT DESCRIPTION 
 
Goal:  The vision for Golden Women is to increase economic and 
leadership opportunities available to Swazi women, primarily rural 
women.  Golden Women intends to create 200+ jobs in addition to the 
existing 100.  Twenty of these jobs would be management and 
leadership positions, all held by women.  Golden Woman also aspires 
to be the first 100 percent black woman-owned business to become a 
leader in Swaziland's handcraft industry.  Once Golden Women has 
achieved this scale, TechnoServe projects that it will be able to 
operate sustainably without outside assistance.  In the future, the 
business plans to reinvest its profits to enable further growth. 
 
Golden Women is a very promising initiative because it has many keys 
to success in place: 
 
A market exists to buy Golden Women's products: Golden Spiderweb, 
the business's core customer, is committed to working with Golden 
Women, and would like to increase order sizes.  In addition, Baobab 
Batik regularly sources stuffed dolls, and Golden Women can leverage 
its relationships to sell more products locally.  Other potential 
buyers have contacted Golden Women because they are interested in 
purchasing handknit products (e.g., A Jewish group in the U.S. has 
requested sample hand-knit Yamakas; a UK-based fashion designer 
requested that Golden Women produce hand-knit mohair jumpers). 
 
Golden Women will be able to scale up quickly because it already has 
a partially trained workforce of an estimated 450 women who knot 
and/or crochet, and are desperate for work. 
 
¶D. ACTIVITIES 
 
TechnoServe proposes to engage in the below activities, which are 
critical to enable Golden Women to achieve its goals. TechnoServe 
would dedicate a full-time resource to perform these activities: 
 
Activity #1: Develop business processes, manage the business (1st 6 
months), and train a business manager (after 6 months). These 
include 
developing streamlined business processes and/or systems for: 
customer communications and sales; data, analysis, and reporting; 
financial management (including profitability, costings, pricing, 
accounting, and payroll); human resources; inventory management; 
order management (e.g., production, quality control, distribution); 
purchasing; refinement of the business strategy; identifying in 
consultation with Golden Women a business manager to be trained to 
manage the business in accordance with the newly designed business 
processes. The business should operate self-sufficiently with this 
resource one year from the start of the project. 
 
Activity #2: Implement a sales and marketing strategy in order to 
sell to new customers by facilitating the development of a marketing 
strategy including a trading name, desired brand image, typical 
customer, etc. Marketing materials such as business card, label, 
logo, catalogue, web site will be designed and produced.  A sales 
strategy will also be put in place. TechnoServ and Golden Women 
Director will 
attend SARCDA trade shows in August 2010 and March 2011. 
 
Activity #3: Train knitters and group leaders: TechnoServe will 
assist Golden Women in developing these trainings. Training topics: 
knitting skills; the importance of quality control; basics of the 
business Site leaders - how to train and manage others; financial 
management; management of materials (e.g., cotton); how to ensure 
high quality results; how to communicate effectively with the 
director and the business manager; basics of the business. 
 
Activity #4: Purchase needed cotton: While the business can 
currently fund enough cotton for 150-250 units, it does not have 
enough cash to purchase the cotton it would need to fill 
larger-scale orders. Together with currently available funds, 
Technoserve proposes E50,000 (6,666 USD) to purchase additional 
cotton. This would fund cotton for 1.5 orders at the 450 unit/300 
woman scale. Golden Women needs funding for 1.5 orders because 
customers may not pay until 45 days after an initial order is 
filled. After this initial purchase, the business will be able to 
use sales revenues to purchase additional cotton and will no longer 
rely on funding. 
 
¶E. DESIRED OUTCOMES 
 
Golden Women has the potential to make a significant and measurable 
impact on Swaziland's rural women. The project aims to achieve the 
following three core goals by the end of 2011: 
 
Create 200+ new fair wage jobs for Swazi women (at or above the 
minimum Swaziland handcrafts wage of E 3.23 per hour). 
 
Create 20 leadership jobs (site leader, business manager, or 
production manager) for Swazi women. 
 
Operate as a self-sustainable business without any need for further 
funding. Reinvest profits to grow the business. 
 
These new jobs will help women achieve positions of economic 
stability and allow them to take on an important new role as a 
breadwinner. Women typically use the money they earn to buy basic 
household items such as salt and oil, to cover childrens' school 
fees, or even as extra spending cash to purchase items they may not 
have previously owned. 
 
¶F. PERFORMANCE MEASURES 
 
TechnoServe proposes to track performance using the following 
metrics: 
- Number of women employed on a monthly basis 
- Average hourly wage per woman employed 
- Number of women in leadership positions 
- Total sales (approx monthly sales of E 75,000 needed to employ 300 
women; or less if sales are regional, because the 75,000 includes 
substantial shipping costs) 
- Profit (e.g., business must earn profit to be self-sustaining) 
- Number of wholesale customers 
- Existence of a capacitated business manager by June 2011 
 
¶G. DETAILED BUDGET 
 
TechnoServe strongly believes that it can help Golden Women achieve 
its growth goals. However, TechnoServe cannot currently dedicate the 
time and resources needed to implement this aggressive growth 
strategy because the above activities are beyond the scope of the 
funding TechnoServe receives from any source.  With the funding 
proposed here, TechnoServe will be able to dedicate a resource 
person for one year to assist Golden Women by playing a direct, 
hands-on role in assisting the knitters through the entire 
production process (from sourcing of materials to training of 
knitters, to controlling quality, to liaising with the market, etc). 
 In addition, TechnoServe proposes pass-through funding to Golden 
Women for specific marketing and materials expenses. The detailed 
project budget is as follows: 
 
Line Item    Rate    Unit  Total 
Salaries          E 236,250 
- Business advisor   236,250  /year 
Fringe Benefits         E 101,753 
- 43.07 percent 
Allowances            E 104,500 
- Housing 
- Airfare subsidy (home leave) 
Office Expenses          E 31,440 
- Rent, systems, and facil. 2,620  /mo 
International Travel          E 27,000 
- Transport(regional)   3,000  /trip 
- Accommodation / per diems   750  /day 
Local Travel            E 12,240 
- Mileage @ E2.3/km   170   /trip 
Equipment (Cost