Tripbod traveller in Rwanda inspired by locals!

Following the research I conducted, I realised I had made some valuable observations regarding African local business.

One major outcome found from talking to these locals was the immense good that the money was doing, as any money made was utilised so efficiently. The first use would always be school fees, because all these people want is an education, which is not state-covered like we receive yet barely appreciate.

The next main point I noticed while interviewing these locals was the selflessness and generosity of them all, as maybe half of the craft shops were set up to raise money for others:
• Some were raising money for a group of orphans, to pay for school fees and general essentials such as food and clothing. The children made crafts to sell, and some money was reinvested in the business to buy stock whilst the majority of the profit goes to the children. I mentioned they were orphans; this came about when some rebels from the Congo came over the border and massacred many of the locals here.
• There were a few stalls, all run separately but for similar purposes, where the majority of the proceeds is given to women, some of them widows, that are caring for their husbands and/or children with H.I.V. They make crafts from home and these are sold in the shop to pay for medicine, school fees and general essentials to survive.
• There were several different organisations set up where the profit goes towards good causes. It baffled me that the little that is made goes straight to bare essentials or good causes. The general ethos is to make something from nothing; maybe this is just a survival technique.
Whilst we were researching and interviewing the locals, Edwin was interviewing the managers at the exclusive lodges and hotels in the area to ask if they would also be interested in making a beneficial relationship with the locals to utilise local resources and build the capacity of the locals, hopefully further educating the population and expanding the ability for these areas to prosper and therefore develop, which will subsequently have a ripple effect across the country... Well, that’s the plan anyway, and so far people were being very receptive; or maybe Edwin was particularly good at explaining that everyone would benefit from these changes.

The afternoon was spent nosing around lodges and cottages, exclusive and very, very expensive, painfully so. Edwin was still discussing business with hotel owners at this point while myself and Doreen pretended we could afford to stay in this $1000 per person per night, fairly average in my eyes, hotel room. The part I would pay for is the view and the local interaction; this we got for the bargain price of $10 per night maximum at the Gorilla Friends guest house – plus an incomparable atmosphere!

Either way, the day ended on a positive note. We all returned to the Gorilla Friends guest house, to the starkly decorated bar, tired, but in that really satisfying exhausted way that the day had gone well.
The next day would be spent travelling back down, traversing the narrow, terrifying tracks out of the mountains in search of a far flung place called Kisoro.

Tripbod traveller in Rwanda interviews local vendors

We are, as it happens, lodging at a humble guest-house called Gorilla Friends; we found this apt and somewhat amusing as we are friends of the gorillas – however the amusement may have been at the giant elephant that was in the room, which was that this guest house was a little basic, and we still had to investigate the long drop loos out in the back! Oh my... all we could do now was to have a few beers, happy days! Oh, and the food was fantastic, who would have thought it, eh?

As I had expected, I awoke and was amazed at the misty sunshine all around, like a winter morning in the Lake District really. Just glorious! Then, off we set to do our research; we were to interview the local people on the craft stalls in Bwindi.
As I have noticed, in Africa the idea of competitive pricing is not really evident and also there is no real knowledge that if you swamp the market then there is no market. Therefore, in towns, villages and jungles alike, if man set up a stall to sell crafts then suddenly, within seconds twelve more would pop up surrounding this man’s humble stall, all selling identical products. This is why in Kigali there are regions in the city only selling hardware or only selling clothes and so on, completely overwhelming the customer. This was evident in Bwindi; on one small stretch of road, maybe 100 metres in length, there were approximately twenty craft stalls. It was our job to interview these locals to ask them if they had any interest in expanding business and maybe diversifying into other areas such as agriculture, or interlinking with the private sector businesses such as the very smart private lodges catering to exclusive high-end clients, and selling their products there.

As expected, many already had been expanding, with any money earned being reinvested in the current shop, used to pay for school fees or invested in land - and maybe even in property building. These people utilise all they have, however small, and make it work for them; they make something from nothing. This was mind-boggling; the entrepreneurship and drive of these people in the middle of this forest was just inspirational!