DROOGFONTEIN SOLAR POWER HELPS TO BOOST LOCAL ENTERPRISES

Droogfontein Solar Power’s Enterprise Development strategy is focused on the support of local small and medium black owned companies, which includes capital injection to improve their service offering and ability to seek growth opportunities. A recent beneficiary of this programme, ACDC Express, received funding for a vehicle, to support the company’s daily operations.

“The addition of a much needed delivery vehicle has brought down our operating costs as we were previously making use of courier services to deliver goods to our clients,” said Ms Wesi, owner of ACDC Express.

This 100% black woman-owned local Kimberly business had been struggling to meet its customer obligations, due to a lack of reliable transport. This led to the potential loss of both short term revenue and the inability to secure long term supplier contracts.  ACDC Express is also a supplier to Droogfontein Solar Power, the donation therefore also forms part of their supplier development initiative.

“Without a reliable vehicle, ACDC Express Kimberely was unable to adequately service their clients or increase their stream of revenue, meaning that this enterprise’s future growth prospects were actually at risk,” explained Hlengiwe Radebe, Economic Development Director of Droogfontein Solar Power.

In addition to benefitting ACDC Express Kimberley, Droogfontein Solar Power has a number Enterprise Development initiatives which have been implemented over the last three years.  The solar plant’s programmes aim to assist and accelerate the sustainability of local enterprises by ploughing financial resources into the local area. These initiatives will continue for the 20 year life span of the project and will remain focused on local communities in the Kimberley, Riverton, Ritchie and Barkly West areas.

 

February 2018