dyton mupawaenda
Africa Moyo Deputy News Editor
Some Zimbabweans take the slightest of opportunities to speak ill of their country the moment they arrive in a foreign land.
The idea being to ensure that they can later claim their safety back home is in jeopardy and seek to stay in that country as at risk populations.
Not so with Cadrick Chimuti (20) and Tanaka Muvezwa (21), who are learning at separate universities in Türkiye.
Cadrick is a second year student at Medipol Istanbul University, pursuing an economics degree, while Tanaka is studying software engineering at Nisantasi University.
The two have embraced President Mnangagwa’s call on every citizen to play a part in promoting economic diplomacy so as to transform the economy with a view to attain Vision 2030 of an upper-middle income economy.
They say they were jolted into action after carefully studying the National Development Strategy 1, and the country’s investment policies.
Cadrick and Tanaka have since formed a research group on behalf of Zimbabwean companies that want to invest in Türkiye.
Turkish investors keen to take up opportunities in Zimbabwe are also assisted with market intelligence.
Where they face challenges or need further clarification, they refer the potential investors to Zimbabwe’s Ambassador to Türkiye Alfred Mutiwazuka.
Last week, the two attended the Türkiye-Africa Business and Economic Forum in Istanbul, which brought together nearly 4 000 delegates from Türkiye and Africa.
They could be seen pacing up and down to attend different panel discussions to broaden the scope of their work.
Asked why they decided to start working with potential investors wanting to commit their funds into Zimbabwe and Türkiye, Cadrick said he has “always been interested in economic research across all industries”.
“And after extensively studying the National Development Strategy 1 in Zimbabwe, I was impressed by the investor friendly policies and growth-oriented policies; that’s when the journey began,” he said.
“I started off by attending economic forums to understand the market and I was also pitching ideas and marketing industries in Zimbabwe, and I realised that many investors were interested.
“I connected mainly with investors who were interested in infrastructure development, some of whom include Matar Real Estate and Alkent Real Estate, and they gave me an opportunity to implement my research ideas in their firms and they introduced me to investors in tourism who I conducted research with and I shared the ideas with the Zimbabwe Embassy and I grew from there.”
Cadrick said he conducted research for four months and began to represent investors in real estate and the tourism business six months ago.
“Potential investors are very much interested in Zimbabwe because of its resource endowment and investor friendly policies. I have been connecting them with many firms in Zimbabwe, and the Zimbabwe Embassy in Ankara is also playing a major role in engaging these investors. So it is a combined effort,” said Cadrick.
His research colleague, Tanaka, focuses on the integration of technical methodologies in infrastructure.
Tanaka says he has conducted “significant research” in the domains of smart housing technology and the implementation of chatbot technology, with a particular emphasis on the programming and software development aspects of those innovations.
“We produce fine research and we are here at the Türkiye-Africa Business conference and many companies are here from across Africa, from across Europe to explore ways of improving our services.
“We want to see more investors from Zimbabwe coming to Türkiye, and more investors from Türkiye going to Zimbabwe,” said Tanaka.
Cadrick and Tanaka’s efforts, and those of other individuals and groups, will help Zimbabwe attain Vision 2030, brick-by-brick, and stone-upon-stone.
Online Reporter