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GABORONE – What does it take for a Motswana woman to venture into a relatively uncommon business dominated by bigger and established players and do so well that she not only annexes a significant market share but goes beyond borders to have offices dotted around the globe?
The Business Diary was privileged to attend a press conference where Enterprise Botswana – an entrepreneurship training and development organization – announced that Joy Simakane a local business woman had defied odds and made it into the last 10 standing women in the run for Women in Business Award.
“This is a prestigious biannual award of the United Nations Conference and Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in recognition of high performance by companies run by women all over the world,” announced David Maswabi and veteran trainer, mentor and Managing Director for Enterprise Botswana.
Two finalists from Botswana were selected to join the rest of the world in the competition and Simakane emerged as one of the world’s ten finalists for further selection into the final three who will be announced in Geneva on April 26, at UNCTAD’s second session of the ‘Investment, Enterprise and Development Commission.’ The contestants were drawn from a 193 member states pool.
This is not the first time Simakane has broken the glass ceiling. But what has it taken this relentless woman to come this far?
With P2000.00 borrowed from her mother to obtain a freight agency license which facilitated the establishment of Extramile Express from scratch and a busload of faith, the courage to conquer physical and mental frontiers and an undaunted perseverance against all sorts of challenges associated with starting a freight company.
Extramile Express is now a success story whose wings have spread to Namibia, South Africa and the United Kingdom where the company currently has branches.
“I have always wanted to have branches around the world with a head office in Botswana,” said the non assuming Empretec Trainee who shared how amazingly refreshing it is for her when she sits down in her office to go through reports from her UK office.
Extramile Express’ conglomeration is an ongoing quest and “we are now eying China and Singapore,” she said.
Back home she has branches in Mahalapye, Palapye, Selebi Phikwe, Francistown, Maun, Kasane and Gaborone where Simakane controls a 119 personnel operation from.
Extramile Express offers a range of freight services including Customs Controlling and Clearing, Warehousing, Bonded Warehousing, Freight Forwarding and Messenger Delivery Services and is a very good example of the Botswana government’s citizenship empowerment initiatives and thriving SMME.
Simakane has swum upstream and is now going beyond uncharted waters by soaring upwards as a hopeful for what may become a first ever feat for Botswana.
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