BY NONHLANHLA MABHIKWA
The Center for Innovation and Technology (CITE) made its debut at this year’s Sanganai/Hlanganani World Tourism Expo, as it seeks to position itself in the market.
The media organisation offers various services through its Asakhe Online platform which includes its flagship Asakhe Daily newsletter, Social Media Management, Advertising, Corporate Events Management, Documentary Production, and Live Streaming among other services.
The Expo is an annual tourism trade fair organised by the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority. It showcases the widest variety of Africa’s best tourism products and attracts international visitors and media from across the world.
This year’s expo runs from 12 to 14 October at the Zimbabwe International Exhibition Center under the theme, “Tourism Investment- Re-imagining sustainable partnerships”.
The CITE stand is positioned at the entrance to Hall 3 with CITE staff on hand to answer questions from visitors and to discuss business opportunities.
CITE’s Business Development Manager, Sehlule Ncube said businesses can take advantage of the various platforms offered by CITE to market their products and services.
“Exhibitors can also find out how to partner with us using our featured programs; The Breakfast Club, Fix My City, Girl Let’s Talk, Screenshot the Podcast as well as Asakhe Online X spaces,” said Ncube.
As part of its engagements, CITE interacted with various businesses exhibiting at the expo who expressed interest in partnering with the media organisation.
One of the companies that interacted with CITE is FSD International, a logistics company that doubles as an agent for a Chinese-based company- MK Enterprises. The company assists individuals and businesses to shop and ship goods from China to Zimbabwe.
“We source the product, check the quality, purchase the product for the client and also ship the product from China to Zimbabwe,” said Morrison Chigwende, the Sales Agent.
He said that the company uses 3 ways of shipping. Freight Express takes 2-3 days and costs $21/kg, Normal Freight which takes 12-15 days at $14.50/kg and sea transport takes 55 days at $450/cbm or 1000kgs. The costs include duty and insurance.
“It is our responsibility that the customer gets the product they want in its good shape. Before you purchase the product we have our team in China that sources the product, takes videos for the customer to see the product and its quality and approves the purchase of the product,” said Chigwende.
He also said that the customer pays the product fee upfront to necessitate the purchase of the product, and then they can pay the shipping fee and agent fee (5% of the product cost) upon receiving their goods.
“The customer collects their package from the nearest airport if it is by freight and for big orders that come through the ports we collect the package from the port and then arrange with the customer on payments, for some we have paid 50% of the transport costs,” he said.
CITE also spoke to Salesio Zvawada the Project Manager of the Great Zimbabwe Development Project which seeks to stimulate inclusive sustainable tourism by enhancing the Great Zimbabwe Site so that it becomes more visible but also impressive to generate national revenue for Zimbabwe.
“The project seeks to strengthen four areas; National Museum Monuments of Zimbabwe to manage the site so that it doesn’t deteriorate to keep the structures as intact as possible, the interpretation of the site which is the story of the Great Zimbabwe mainly the values of the culture, and renovating the structure so that there are more services for our visitors,” said Zvawada.
