The fourth cycle of UGEFA’s Catalyser Programme just finished, with 23 inspiring enterprises successfully completing the Catalyser workshops. Therefore, more than 140 enterprises completed the UGEFA Catalyser Programme, underlining the large scale of this programme. Cycle four already looked promising in the application stage. Of the 128 enterprises that handed in their application, 23 were chosen.
In the last four months, participants of three cohorts (two in Kampala and one in Fort Portal) polished their business model, prepared for growth, improved their financial management, created an investment plan, extended their impact monitoring, and prepared their loan applications. However, not only the development of tangible documents and key outputs was very beneficial but also networking and peer-learning opportunities, as well as invitations to events.
Collected feedback at the end of cycle four showed that the participants found the Catalyser workshops very useful. When asked, “how likely are you to recommend the UGEFA Catalyser to a peer enterprise?”, 96% answered “very likely” and 4% “likely”. When asked what has changed in your enterprise due to the UGEFA support, one participant replied: “The training has given us a deeper understanding of how to structure our company,” and another mentioned, “now I can know the data of my enterprise well”.
Shedding more light on the sectors of the cycle four enterprises, 12 are operating in Clean Energy, 7 in Green Manufacturing, 2 in Sustainable Waste Management, 1 in Sustainable Tourism, and 1 in Sustainable Transport. Moreover, looking at their growth plans, the most common growth strategy was market deepening, followed by market development, product development, and diversification.
Experienced business development service providers facilitated all workshops through interactive step-by-step tools. More than 30 business advisors were trained in Training of Trainers workshops with the UGEFA methodology and toolkits, of which 24 have delivered the UGEFA Enterprise Support.
Giving a glimpse into what comes next for the Catalyser cycle four enterprises: the participants interested in advancing their growth plans through debt financing are matched with one of UGEFA’s partner banks. During the Catalyser Programme, UGEFA also organises a “Partner Bank Meet and Greet Session” so that enterprises can already ask their most urgent questions to the partner banks and decide which bank they would like to be matched with. So far, UGEFA’s Funding Facilitation Facility has unlocked more than 3,000 Million UGX (780,000 EUR) for green enterprises from past UGEFA cycles.
