Desire to serve community births Mulobezi’s first bakery

DOREEN NAWA, Lusaka
MANY people venture into business with the sole purpose of making money for a comfortable living. But for Brian Chinyandula, 36 of Sichili in Mulobezi his motivation to start a business was born out of the desire to serve his community.
As an entrepreneur and a civil servant, Mr Chinyandula has a rather unusual approach to social responsibility. He believes giving back to the community should be a primary responsibility of any business and not secondary as is the case for most commercial entities.
For a long time Mr Chinyandula had been pondering how he could serve his community.
While working at Sichili Mission Hospital he identified a need in his area and that was a bakery.
“When I came here in 2009,” he says, “I became aware of the harsh realities that rural people face in accessing certain vital foods like bread and other confectionaries. So it was like a burden to me. I started thinking of how to make bread and other wheat products accessible to the people of Sichili."
The absence of such products compelled him to establish Namuchi Bakery, the first bakery in Mulobezi district.
Before the establishment of Namuchi Bakery, people in Sichili used to get bread and other wheat products from Livingstone, situated about 267 kilometres away or Sesheke which is approximately 150 kilometres away from Sichili.
Mr Chinyandula was looking for a business venture that could not only give him profit but also help solve the challenges people in his community face.
The Namuchi Bakery, which opened in October last year, could have been established much earlier but was hampered by lack of electricity in the area and only came to fruition after the Rural Electrification Authority (REA) connected Sichili area to the national grid.
“Last year, when REA connected Sichili to the national grid, it was a dream come true. I started saving money the moment I learnt that REA would connect Sichili to the national grid. So when it was close to fruition, I got a supplementary loan from the bank to finance the purchase of bakery machinery,” Mr Chinyandula said.
Mr Chinyandula said he has always wanted to do things a certain way as an entrepreneur and that is the reason he was patient enough to wait for electricity connections in the area.
When he got the loan from the bank, Mr Chinyandula bought bakery machinery among them ovens, mixers, slicers, trays and baking tins from Johannesburg, South Africa.
“Namuchi Bakery has offered the opportunity to make money, but at the same time to change people’s lives,” Mr Chinyandula said.
Changing lives at Namuchi Bakery starts with providing quality bread and other confectionaries, and this was made possible because of access to electricity.
Lack of access to electricity is a cause of poverty, not just a result of it.
For Mr Chinyandula, gaining access to electricity is really life-changing.
“People can increase their productivity, children can study, read books and watch television, which allows them to be connected to the world,” he said.
Access to electricity has the power to transform lives especially in rural communities of Zambia where more than 95 percent of homes have no access.
“For those with access to electricity like us here in Sichili, it has changed our lives. We can now keep in touch with friends and family, and those in cities can use their mobile phones to send money to relatives in rural areas.
“Electricity is a vital product, without which no true development is possible. Access to energy for the poorest rural populations often reduces poverty by developing income-generating activities, and also education, health, access to water,” Mr Chinyandula said.
As an entrepreneur Mr Chinyandula acknowledges that starting up a business in the rural areas comes with a lot of challenges among them lack of infrastructure, skilled manpower and access to financing.
He acquired one of the dilapidated infrastructures and renovated it to house the bakery.
He further says, “It’s difficult to find right people to employ here due to lack of education and skills and histories of homelessness after the retrenchment of people from Zambia Railways. I had a challenge to ensure that the people I employee will do the job professionally, putting the interest of our customers first. But amid all these challenges, I made sure I found people that will serve the community.
With an establishment of four fulltime employees Namuchi Bakery is currently producing over K1,000 worth of bread and other wheat products supplied locally and beyond Mulobezi.
Mr Chinyandula, owner and chief executive officer of Namuchi Bakery, is married and has two children.