Biography

In 2005, I had completed data collection for my dissertation and was working at Henderson Research Station when my supervisor notified me of the KSAL scholarship. It came at just the right time since all other financial sources were depleted, but I still had to complete my Master’s degree. I attended a series of KSAL workshops that coached us on various business principles, wealth creation and thought leadership. The KSAL training improved my self-confidence and helped me integrate my academic and business acumen. After the training, I was able to complete my thesis in less than six months and I was better able to deal with supervisors using negotiation skills I had learned. While working at Henderson, I developed a guinea fowl project and become an expert in poultry production. One of my major successes in the poultry business is the introduction of feed processing and milling, thereby improving the profitability of the business enterprise. A later partial scholarship from Kellogg enabled me to develop a compelling PhD proposal and enroll with the University of Limpopo. In 2007, the peak of Zimbabwe's political instability compounded by upheaval at the university, I could not get a further scholarship and had to stop my PhD. I went back home and took a lectureship post at the University of Zimbabwe. With the economic meltdown in Zimbabwe, the salaries were not adequate to support me and my family, forcing me to go back to South Africa to look for work. During this time I learned a lot of business survival tactics from working with different entrepreneurs. Three years later, I returned to Zimbabwe and was hired by a previous employer. I helped improve productivity of both feed and poultry. I was also able to build a new slaughter plant for processing the chickens. As I was excelling in my work, I was head hunted to start an agribusiness venture based on broiler farming. I then joined Goldsearch Technical Services and now lead a new agribusiness venture named Golden Chickens. We process 5000 broilers per day and supply major fast food outlets including hotels and restaurants with 100% natural chicken, no additives. My dream now is to complete my PhD and commercialise smallholder poultry production using IT as a platform.