On the 1st of November 2019, UNAT held a workshop at Sinza, Dar es Salaam for members of VICOBA (Village Community Banking) around the theme “Entrepreneurship and Empowerment”.

The participants were all entrepreneurs and the majority run their own business. In this regard, the purpose of the workshop was to inspire and equip participants with a tool that can be used to further develop and strengthen their business.

The workshop was an interactive session focused on Sustainable Development Goals number 1: No poverty, 5: Gender Equality and 8: Decent work and Economic Growth. The session started by asking the participants to think about who their role model is and why. This was followed by an activity where participants were asked to relate to different statements concerning work in Tanzania, which opened up for reflection and discussion on various norms and prejudices that may exist in society.

The main activity of the workshop was the “SWOT Analysis”. SWOT stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats and is a strategic planning tool used to help a person identify their internal strengths and weaknesses and external opportunities and threats. The participants were divided into small groups and provided with a SWOT sheet in order to fill in their own strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in relation to their business.  This enabled participants to, in a concrete way, reflect over their current situation as well as their future ambitions.

After completing the task, the workshop was concluded with some of the participants sharing their analyzes with the whole group and relating them to the Sustainable Development Goals.