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Late last year, UWA Business School graduate Wadzi Katsidzira gave up her job at the WA Department of Treasury and Finance to move to Kenya. Now, Wadzi is facing whole new challenges at Kwetu Training Centre for Sustainable Development (Kwetu), where she is working as part of AusAid's Australian Youth Ambassadors for Development Program (AYAD).

The new role, explains Wadzi, was the perfect way to broaden her horizons. ‘I was born in Zimbabwe and was really keen to experience living and working as an adult in an African country,' she said. ‘When the AYAD program expanded to Africa last year, I applied for my assignment at Kwetu. The role is one that matched my skills and looked to me to be one where I could really add value and learn.'

Kwetu is a not-for-profit organisation that trains youth, women and farmers in fishing, beekeeping, environmental conservation, HIV/AIDS prevention and other areas. It aims to alleviate poverty among rural communities on the Kenyan coast.

‘Kwetu is well placed as the only NGO in the Kenyan coast that is engaging communities in mangrove conservation and providing training in alternative livelihood methods,' said Wadzi. ‘The challenge now for Kwetu is to best position itself to rise to that potential - I hope to help them in that process by providing some of the essential organisational infrastructure and helping them mobilise resources so that their activities are sustainable.

‘I am the Finance and Resource Mobilisation Officer at Kwetu and my primary role is to support the organisation in its long-term strategic planning by: updating their strategic plan; identifying potential donors; and writing proposals for funding. I also have a responsibility to support the accountant in devising a budget tracking tool and ensure the financial procedures are followed and implemented.'

Upon arriving in Africa, Wadzi found that working for a non-government organisation had its own challenges. ‘Having previously worked at a bank and at a major government department, I have found it challenging to adapt to working in a small organisation (15 staff) and dealing with all the resource limitations associated with that,' she said.

‘Kwetu is a grassroots NGO - we work directly with the community and sometimes the donor's provisions do not match community expectations. Being the interface between resource users (communities) and resource givers (donors), it falls to us to manage and respond to those community expectations while remaining within the donor's provisions.  That's a tough thing to do (and unfortunately it's not taught in the classroom) but it is absolutely critical to our success because it impacts on our most valuable asset, which is credibility both with the community and among donors.'

Maintaining Kwetu's credibility will allow it to continue in one of its biggest roles - increasing the employability of young people. ‘Kenyan society can broadly be described as a society on the brink of change, so while I was struck by how Western and modern it is in many respects, there still remain huge tracts of disadvantage,' said Wadzi.

‘In the workplace, for example, there is a lot of emphasis placed on experience and educational qualifications, and less emphasis on competency and broader skills.  This focus on qualifications and experience makes the work environment challenging for young Kenyans in two big ways: firstly, it is very tough to gain entry; and secondly, once you're in it is still difficult to establish credibility.'

The work of Kwetu Training Centre, however, aims to address this disadvantage by providing young Kenyans with both skills and experience. The centre's work now covers, mariculture (fish, crab and prawn farming), agro-processing (bee keeping, organic farming and solar drying), youth governance, and HIV outreach and testing.

Wadzi graduated from UWA in 2008 with a Bachelor of Commerce (honours) and a Bachelor of Science. She will continue working at Kwetu Training Centre until October 2011.

For more information visit Kwetu Training Centre , or for more information visit AusAid's Australian Youth Ambassadors for Development Program .

Media references

Heather Merritt
Director, External Relations
UWA Business School
T: +618 6488 8171
M: 0419 950 027
E: [email protected]

Verity Chia
Communications Officer
UWA Business School
T: +618 6488 1346
E: [email protected]