Kenya’s agriculture sector up on government’s priority list

In the words of Wikipedia, Agriculture is, “the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi, and other life forms for food, fiber, biofuel, medicines and other products used to sustain and enhance human life.”

Of late, many developed as well as developing economics have come to realize the potential that their agriculture sectors hold. And with this realization, the governments have started strengthening their agriculture policies and opening ways to make their people skilled enough to enter the sector and capitalize on the opportunities that the sector has to offer.

Kenya is one such fine example of a country that has been putting tremendous focus on its agriculture sector’s development.

In a bit to train its people for various agriculture related roles, Kenyan government is introducing agriculture friendly policies and schemes. The key stakeholders, such as corporates, are also partnering with training specialists who can conduct agriculture sales training in Kenya to add value to the entire agriculture value chain.
   
It is to be noted that a standard agriculture sales training in Kenya program can be customized to improve the productivity of farm agents and seed distributors. Many other training programs can be designed and developed to cater to the specific needs of key stakeholders of the sector.

Agriculture already makes a significant portion of Kenya’s annual revenues. And with these new initiatives, Kenya’s government has shown its commitment towards a wholesome agricultural development. It just needs to introduce more polices and schemes to boost the sector and engage with the right partners for successful implementation and execution of those schemes.

Why do profitable businesses (which shell out large amounts of money on CSR) need learning and skills development specialists on board?

In the words of a leading learning and skills development company in India, “Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives, launched in isolation, not only amount to overhead expenses, but also make it difficult to quantify impact of the CSR programmes, thus promoting distrust amongst stakeholders and further eroding the brand value of the organization.”

It’s therefore important that corporate social responsibility is gelled well with the business imperatives of the corporates. Many corporates find it difficult and look for some specialists. This is exactly where corporate social responsibility companies come into the scene!

A professional corporate social responsibility company in India helps corporates to understand the inside out of the CSR and how they can easily and effectively integrate CSR into their business imperatives and thus make the most out of their CSR spending.

Whether you are a telecom giant or an insurance provider, or an automobile company, you can leverage the expertise of a learning and skills development partner to spend wisely on CSR programmes and quantify the impact of those programmes.

Corporate social responsibility companies will help you throughout the process: from the formation of the CSR strategy to its integration into the business imperatives, to its successful execution. From global brands to PSUs, many companies have got into strategic partnerships with leading learning and skills development companies.

Under these programmes, these corporate social responsibility companies train youth from the unprivileged and economically weaker sections of the society; apart from this, they also invest in education, skill development, gender equality, women empowerment and employment creation.

Now if you too feel like giving edge to your CSR initiatives, partner with a leading learning and skills development company that has good experience in CSR implementation, monitoring and execution.

Agriculture holds the key to a Transformed Africa

Agriculture had been one of the most neglected sectors in Africa. For long, it struggled on account of absence of supportive policies and frameworks, and lack of skilled manpower. Though it is the major earning source for over 65 percent of labour force in Africa, the sector really couldn’t grow to its potential. However, the overall scenario has now begun to improve.

African governments have come to realize the mammoth potential that the sector holds and are partnering with the private players to uplift the sector through various programs and schemes. Agriculture sales training in Kenya is one fine example of training programs that have been developed to boost the productivity of farm agents and seed distributors, and thus will impact the entire value chain of agriculture sector.

The agriculture training in Africa is provided by several end-to-end learning providers, which possess the inside out knowledge of the sector and have the infrastructure to reach out to those working directly and indirectly for the agriculture sector.

As per the figures available:
Africa holds 50 per cent of the world’s remaining uncultivated land in the world
By 2030, the size of the agriculture sector in Africa would reach $1 trillion (as per the World Bank’s estimates)

Agriculture is the 3rd fastest growing sector in Africa, followed by Resources, Wholesale & Retail
To ensure a sustained development in the sector, the governments of African countries must stick to agriculture friendly policies and engage with the training specialists who develop programs, such as agriculture sales training in Kenya, which can impact the entire value chain of Agriculture sector.

For more on Africa’s agriculture sector or vocational education in Africa, read our other blog posts.

Mission 12 Million!

By 2022, India’s economic engine may require over 500 million skilled people. Now getting to this figure may not be possible. What is possible as of now is to take little steps, one after another.

NSDC – National Skill Development Corporation – has been taking these little steps in association with some leading training organisations, such as Centum Learning. And together – through the Joint Venture created by NSDC and Centum Learning - they have set the target of skilling and placing over 12 million youth across sectors, which include auto and auto components, building and construction materials, healthcare, textiles, real estate services, electronics and IT hardware, organised retail, and tourism & hospitality.

With their eyes set on ‘skilling and placing 12 million youth’, these organisations offer various employability programs that in turn create corporate ready workforce.

In all these decades, we have grown in numbers, but we still have miles to go to when it comes to having the right skills for the right job. Despite availability of millions of jobs across sectors, industries are facing an acute short of skilled workforce. And this shortage can be overcome only when companies, like Centum Learning (which is a highly reputed NSDC partner), keep on rolling out employability programs and take them to the remotest corners of India.

True, little steps are what we need; the good thing is we have started taking them.

PSUs are gradually changing their outlook towards customer service

When Wal-Mart Founder Sam Walton said “the goal as a company is to have customer service that is not just the best but legendary,” he stated the golden rule of running a profitmaking business in a highly competitive scenario. In the globalised world, competition is just a click away for the consumers and has changed the way companies have functioned so far. Of course, it has been particularly challenging for the Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) to deal with this transformation. Since these government owned entities had followed the principles of bureaucratic administration from the time of independence when they were set up to further economic development, liberalisation in 1991 struck them hard.

Privatisation gave birth to a volatile market brimming with cut-throat struggle as consumers became aware of better quality and services especially in banking, health care and aviation sectors. Intensifying demands, archaic products, lack of human resource and poor facilities led to the downfall of these public corporations with huge losses in market share. The worst hit were definitely the public sector banks (PSBs) as advanced technology and customer relationship management (CRM) driven private banks started ruling the roost in the post-liberalisation era. In the wake of the plummeting public banking sector, the government set up the Narsimham Committee (1991) that recommended focusing on enhancing the quality of customer relations and improving transparency along with instituting the Banking Ombudsman Scheme and Customer Protection Act.

This paradigm shift required expanding the customer base through increased efficiency, financial inclusion, innovation and CRM. However, the main challenge was enticing the high net worth individual (HNWI), who had also evolved with the changing times. Being serviced at a bank was now considered a right by HNWIs rather than getting something extra while carrying out the financial operations. They became more analytical and comparative in terms of products and would settle for nothing but the best in each segment of transaction or savings. Thus, major PSBs in the country underwent a modification process to remodel themselves as a people-oriented organisation to stay ahead of the private players.

Tailoring products as per customer expectations and recent progressive technology like ATMs, phone banking, internet banking along with expansion to remote areas of the country and a performance propelled working environment have all contributed to the growth of PSBs in the current times. One such revolutionary example is Punjab National Bank’s ‘Pragati’ initiative that aims at preferential treatment to loyal and prospective customers at each level of banking through modernisation, answerability, governance, better infrastructure, incentive etc.

Another important aspect of this transformation among the public sector banks involved increasing the number of branches and improving the quality of staff to develop more and more touch points and maintain a healthy relationship. This led to the much required product differentiation and market segmentation for easy identification and gratification of individual needs. Since personal interaction is the most significant characteristic of service sector, PSBs have realised its prominence and are now building new ways of enhancing customer experience.

In addition, data warehouses due to computerisation have also helped in offering superior financial planning and wealth management related services to consumers. Special relationship managers have been appointed to adhere to the grievances and streamline the processes, making banking effortless for the customers. Apart from upgrading, PSBs have also been effectively communicating about their products and services through various multi-media channels for widespread awareness and engagement. Consequently, the stature of PSBs has seen a meteoric rise in the past few years, gaining an edge over the private entrants, by changing the outlook towards customer satisfaction. Similarly equipped with contemporary information technology architecture, impeccable services, trained staff, customisation policies and customer-friendly approach, other government controlled enterprises are now making their presence felt and will continue to grow in the future.     

The future of India is Vocational!

India would require over 500 million skilled people by 2022. Building such a large base of skilled manpower is a distant dream for the country. But, the policymakers and those working at the grass root levels are trying their best.

Auto and auto components, building and construction materials, real estate services, electronics and IT hardware, food processing, gems & jewellery, organised retail, and tourism & hospitality are amongst the sectors that are already feeling starved of skilled manpower; and their demand for skilled youth would only rise in the coming years.

To bridge the huge gap between demand and supply of skilled manpower, several reputed vocational skills training companies have started reaching out to government, their agencies, and NGOs to skill India so that it doesn’t lag behind in the global race for economic development and sustainability. 

Centum Learning is a fine example of the training companies that are truly dedicated for promoting vocational training in India; these companies also ensure that the participants, once they are finished with their vocational training programme, are duly placed with leading organisations across sectors.

Vocational training programme providers keep introducing more and more innovative skill building programs – such as Certificate Course in Mobile Repairing, Certificate Course in Spoken English, Livelihood Training Course, etc., - to enhance the employability quotient of the urban as well as rural youth of the country. And this skilled manpower would ensure that India’s economic engine does not stop, even for a minute.

What makes experiential learning training an instant hit with the participants?

Experiential Training can be best understood as ‘training that is based on experience and observation’. The concept has been around for long; as a matter of fact, the theory was proposed by psychologist David Kolb who was influenced by the work of other theorists including John Dewey, Kurt Lewin, and Jean Piaget.

Whether you are into heavy earth moving equipment manufacturing or a global pharmaceutical company, you can promote cohesiveness, collaborative effort, and creativity in your teams by exposing them to corporate training programs, which are conducted by incorporating experiential learning training methodology.

A typical training program is made simple yet highly effective by including activities like Flag Hoisting, Egg Drop Exercise, Australian Walk, and Municipal Blues; direct interactions, effective sharing of the best practices and innovative ideas form the core of such corporate training programs. The participants enjoy themselves thoroughly yet gain substantial from the experiential learning training program.

Different corporate training programs providers come up with different techniques/activities for their clients. And they all are intended to help businesses achieve their goals and gain competitive edge in the market.

You too can boost your team performance with these corporate training programs. And there are many training companies around that would help you in this.

Now for more on experiential learning training and learning process outsourcing, follow us/subscribe to our blog.