Tanzania ISTEP– Anne McDonah and I are currently in Tanzania working with MVCCT in Morogoro helping design an advanced entrepreneurship curriculum.  In order to use meaningful examples for the situational analysis and ensure we have the proper topics, we needed to speak with industry owners/managers to ensure we had the necessary information. We selected organizations in three geographic areas as well as different sized companies in different industries. We arrived in Tanzania on Friday, March 11, 2016 and drove to Mikumi where, with the help of Ludavic Saronga, we interviewed three small tourism companies.  They were an excellent source of information and we gained some insightful data from them. 

Monday was a travel day to Morogoro where we met with Sospeter Dickson and Anna Nyoni at the MVCCT campus and discussed the approach for the next few days.  They arranged five interviews for the next 2 and a half days, however one of them could not talk to us because of an urgent matter.  We spoke with three manufacturers and one retail operator on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Thursday was another travel day as we took a long and hot drive to Dar es Salaam. The temperature was 34 degrees and the air conditioner was not working in the vehicle we were in.  On Friday we spoke with two large organizations, one in the manufacturing sector and the other in the industrial gases sector.  Both of these companies gave us insight to new information.

Our findings in the last week were very close to what we expected except for the lack of technology and internet marketing in the small to medium size businesses. It is difficult to stay on the leading edge if you do not keep up with the newest industry technology.

While in Mikumi we were fortunate to spend Sunday morning in the Mikumi National Park where we saw many beautiful animals in their natural habitat, including a couple of lions.

We will continue to work on the curriculum and situation analysis upon our return to Nova Scotia in a couple of days.

Jim Bate

Academic Chair, School of Business

NSCC Pictou Campus