CAPE TOWN - Women entrepreneurs at the top of their game were celebrated as the First Lady Chamber announced the winners of its 2021 Business of the Year awards.
The chamber hosts 12-month programmes aimed at developing key entrepreneurial skills in business owners, in order to create an empowerment platform for women entrepreneurs.
Members recently completed the third year of the programme, and the top three businesses were chosen.
The Business of the Year 2021 award winner was Faziela Harris, founder of LitchiApple.
The brand provides holistic educational resources to all children, fostering inclusive education.
Harris’s products incorporate the use of play dough and building blocks as learning tools for children covering subjects such as language, maths, science and coding.
The winner of the second prize was Nicole Brink, co-owner of Project Bloom, who received the Entrepreneurship in Action online short course award sponsored by the Red and Yellow School of Business.
Zakiyya Brey Amod, part owner of Relish Inc, who received the third prize, was awarded R10 000 sponsored by Wise Builders.
First Lady Chamber (FLC) managing director and co-founder Fatima Wise said women were making great strides in the entrepreneurial space.
"All our members have shown, incubation after incubation, why women are considered resilient and change-makers of our society. They have strived and pushed through despite their challenges and as they say ’the proof is in the pudding’.
“It’s important for us to celebrate achievements such as these, a measure to counteract the stigma and self-doubt that plague many women across the world, which can hinder the way they interact in entrepreneurial spaces.
“Our members are the embodiment of what we set out to achieve when FLC was formulated. It was developed not to only teach and upskill the deep-rooted talent we have embedded in the women of South Africa, but to also create unity, collaboration and a tribe. The essence of which lies in our members.
“Our membership is open .. and we encourage any women needing a community or to upskill to join us,” Wise said.
The female empowerment platform teaches members six key business skills over the course of a year: marketing branding; business law; accounting and compliance; business profile and strategy; pitching presentations; and public speaking.
Chair in social justice at Stellenbosch University. Professor Thuli Madonsela was the guest speaker at the event, and said it was great to see women excelling.
“I came to this event where we are celebrating amazing entrepreneurs who are not just women but young people, and that for me is a major dividend that we need to harness as a nation and as a continent. We are called a young continent because the majority of our population is young but globally women are the majority,” she said.
Cape Times