Category: 2021 Newsletter April

MCCI and the future?

MCCI and the future?

Long gone are the days when joining your neighbourhood chamber of commerce was considered an essential step in doing business. Why?

Some chambers have been slow to innovate and respond to member needs, creating little value proposition to fulfil their ever-evolving stakeholder expectations.

Whether membership is mandatory or not, chambers must offer significant value to all their constituents, whether they are a start-up or a large company, to demonstrate relevance.

Now more than ever, because of the global pandemic, chambers must take an active role in shaping the economic health of their communities.

How are we changing in these challenging times? How are we staying relevant? We, as MCCI, are a service provider to you, and we care about your business.

 

We want our community to enjoy the ease of access to MCCI. We want to be an engaged Chamber, and we can only be that if we are getting your feedback.

  • We stand for local economic development, and our pioneering projects ensure increasing job creation to enhance local economies.
  • We initiated and developed projects that support bold action to tackle climate change and help their members and community face and adapt to today’s climate change challenges.
  • We provide innovative tech solutions for any services, including members retention programmes, certificates of origin, etc., that have disrupted the traditional way of doing business for themselves and or their community.
  • We provide digital transformation support to advertise your business on all social media platforms. Innovative resilience initiatives to combat the economic and health consequences associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, including but not limited to technology programmes, digital platforms, risk and crisis management support, and business continuity guidelines that are designated for the benefit of their communities.
  • We are offering key resources, advocates, and connectors for business.
  • We have a mission centred on supporting and protecting the interests of Middelburg’s business community.
  • We have powerful network opportunities and marketing solutions.
  • We also work to raise Middelburg’s profile as an attractive trade and investment hub.
  • We represent 400 members.
  • MCCI is pro-active and is recognized as one of the best Chambers globally and competed against the best of the best we got recognized internationally for our projects.
  • We want to make the business work for everyone, every day and everywhere. Being part of the ICC and attending webinars of best practice, we attend 300 delegates from 83 countries.
  • We connect to international peers, exchange best practices, share knowledge, explore trade opportunities, and influence economic success.

Chambers of Commerce are the most substantial and most comprehensive world business network found in every community and country worldwide. 12 000 Chambers worldwide.

We will be representing MCCI in November 2021 at the World Chambers Congress in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry hosts the 2021 congress.

Survival and Productivity in the Post-COVID economy

Survival and Productivity in the Post-COVID economy

Gideon Slabbert from Turnaround Resque Solutions and Sinqobile Shoba, Regional Manager from Productivity SA met with Anna-Marth Ott at the

Middelburg Chamber of Commerce & Industry to discuss opportunities to assist the businesses in Middelburg.

During the past year, the exchange rate fluctuations, in conjunction with the unexpected reduction in demand and growing inflation,

have left many South African industries financially distressed.

The question is, how should we address this financial shock within our businesses?

Manufacturing statistics indicate that the COVID Pandemic has set some manufacturing and mining industries as far back as 2013.

If identified early, companies experiencing an economic decline can participate in the Business Turnaround & Recovery Programme.

The programme focuses on preventing job losses and upskilling employment to drive efficiency. The BT&R program seeks to upskill a company’s

existing management by training a company’s core skills and competencies and improving manufacturing processes, ultimately increasing productivity and profitability while retaining employment.

 

Once approved, the duration of the programme is 9-12 months and includes the following;

  • Customer acceptance to the programme;
  • Establishment of the company champions;
  • Training/Capacity Building of the champions;
  • In-depth assessment and Workplan development;
  • Turnaround strategy and implementation;
  • Project close-out;
  • Post-Implementation monitoring and evaluation.

Depending on the company’s size, the BT&R Programme could make funding available for the programme,

valued at R282 800 to R624 800.00 per company. Terms and Conditions Apply.

For more information on the programme, kindly contact CEO Anna-Marth Ott at ceo@middelburginfo.com for more information.

Status of Our Water – Upper Olifants River Catchment?

Status of Our Water – Upper Olifants River Catchment?

A meeting was held on 30 March 2021 via Microsoft Teams to discuss the various issues that affect the catchment area of the upper Olifants River.

The meeting aims to discuss water management issues, collaborations, and any other issues during the year.  No other meetings were held in 2020 after the 26 February 2020 meeting.

Many of the deliverables discussed in the February 2020 meeting were not achieved as DWS has not worked at total capacity.

According to the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency’s environmental department, opencast coal mining covers approximately 4% of the surface area of the

Upper Olifants within the Mpumalanga Province landcover datasets produced in 2017.  Since then, the extent of opencast mining would have increased,

and the 4% would have likewise increased as well.  Middelburg Chamber of Commerce & Industry (MCCI) notes the application by Sing Consulting

in last week’s Middelburg Observer with concern.

If DWS has been working at Lockdown capacity since April 2020, MCCI notes with concern about the operational decisions made that will affect our livelihood and quality of life.

A questionable decision was Minister Lindiwe Sisulu’s decision to employ Cuban engineers. MCCI has had many successful collaborations with universities over the years;

one of our more long-standing collaborations is with Wits Business School.  Why is DWS not utilising our universities with the environmental,

institutional and academic knowledge to deal with our specific water issues?

Water is a human right and essential for our businesses to thrive; we expect the DWS officials that manage our water to be well informed, knowledgeable and working at full capacity.

Let’s Get Golfing!

Let’s Get Golfing!

It is that time of year again. On 7 May 2021, our annual Middelburg Chamber of Commerce & Industry Golf Day will tee off at 10 am; the format is a 2-ball scramble with a shotgun start.

Fanie De Villiers will be joining in on the fun and entertaining the teams and businesses participating. Our Golf Day is one of our popular annual networking events for business.

Last year we showed that the game must go on, within the Covid-19 rules. In 2021 we want to strengthen the relationships and business networking imperative for the survival of SSME’s and larger companies.

We have also set aside a presentation area for participating businesses to host a short 10min verbal presentation on their company throughout the day. We are adding an extra element to the networking during the day.

With different levels of sponsorship, we have opened the gates for all to participate. Registration will include 1x 4 ball, meal & water per player, 10 min presentation time and a goodie bag for each player.

Sponsorship and Team registration ended 1 May at 5 pm. We hope to see you there. 

A huge thank you to our sponsors for making this day possible:

FAW – Highveld Commercial Vehicles and Nashua Mpumalanga

An Eggcelent time was had this Easter

An Eggcelent time was had this Easter

 

The Middelburg Tourism Information Centre ran an Easter day project, selling individually decorated DIY Easter Hunt boxes. Each box was decorated by favourite colour and age.

Inside, the kiddies were surprised with toys, activities, heap and heaps of sweeties and an age-appropriate colouring-in competition.

 

We received sponsorships from the Middelburg community, and orders poured in. It was such a fun new project done by the Info Centre to give back and interact with Middelburg.

We hope to make this an annual activity in the coming years.

 

A huge thank you to all our sponsors; Njala Guest House, Weanhuiskraal Gaste Huis, 3@1 Middelburg, Thomas Ngema Traiding, Life Midmed Hospital and Happy Kids Day Care.

Without our sponsors, this would not have been such a success.

Together we can do anything.