New development programme

Thursday, 15 July 2010 14:04

Western Cape tooling initiative help SME’s through new development programme

July 14, 2010 - The Western Cape Tooling Initiative (WCTI), in partnership with Swisscontact - a non-profit organisation founded by Swiss business and the Swiss government with the goal of stimulating growth in the private sector in selected developing countries - has developed and implemented a Market Development Programme (MDP) for the Western Cape Tool, Die and Mould (TDM) sector.

The MDP was started to implement initiatives and programmes that can respond directly to the recent finding of the Institute for Advancing Tooling (IAT).According to these findings, the South African tooling sector is under severe pressure from countries such as China and India, who tend to outperform local suppliers substantially – both in terms of levels of on time delivery and overall competitiveness.

Grant Stevenson, WCTI CEO, explains that the primary aim of the MDP is to improve the competitiveness of SME clusters in the tooling sector, thereby empowering them to increase their market share. The programme, which came about as a response to a benchmarking study that found that South African tool rooms are generally technically on par with their global counterparts, but lack management skills and customer relationship management (CRM) systems, also offers specific training to equip SME owners with the requisite business management skills.

Stevenson notes that as part of the programme, the WCTI will develop a Supplier Action Plan in which eight selected tool making companies will be receiving support over a period of five months to identify weaknesses and develop systems to plug the gaps.

These interventions seek to improve managerial and business systems capacity at company level. The overall aim is to establish an industry that is based on world class delivery, competency and reliability, leading to an increase in the volume of business for local tool makers who will, through the programme, be able to meet demanding customer expectations.

In addition to the MDP, Swisscontact has linked the WCTI with another USAID funded SME development programme, the South Africa International Business Linkages (SAIBL) organisation. This partnership will combine WCTI and SAIBL resources, which will ensure each SME in the Western Cape goes through a holistic development programme for a period of three years. The WCTI will also make use of the services provided by the Small Enterprise Development Agency or SEDA (a subsidiary of the DTI) to implement business improvement projects in the sector where appropriate.

“This programme gives the WCTI the confidence that each SME will be guided over a prolonged period of time, ensuring that the new systems and changes that are implemented, are monitored and correctly applied ” says Stevenson

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