The small businesses came from all over the district and they received e-vouchers at the Disaster Management Centre offices in Tzaneen on Thursday, January 13. The recipients were from three sectors with agriculture taking home R7000 each, tourism receiving R15 000 each and trade and manufacturing attaining R10 000 each.
The mayor expressed his shock and disappointment at the high number of non-compliant businesses that had applied for the funding.
“Out of the 220 applicants, only 30 complied. We had set aside R2.1 million for the initiative, but because few SMME’s qualified, we will only award R230 000 today.
The remainder of the money will be used to support small businesses.
“We see that there is a lot of work that needs to be done. It is for this reason that through the LED office, we will be starting with workshops for our SMMEs to assist them around compliance before we open for another round of applications,” he explained.
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He outlined that the funding was allocated for businesses in these three industries, which survived the Covid-19 impact.
He further added that the funding comes from money allocated for events such as the Tourism Indaba and Amarula Festival, which has not taken place in the past two years due to the pandemic.
One of the delighted recipients of the e-vouchers was Phefulani Ngomani from L&P Computer Academy from N’wamitwa who received R15 000.
“As a company we are very happy and humbled by the donation, we also wish that the municipality can also assist us with internships for our unemployed youth,” she concluded.
