When Social Entrepreneurship Becomes Bad for Africa
By: Klein Udumaga
Tags: Nigeria, Entrepreneurship, Africa, Social Enterprise, Philanthropy

Your social entrepreneur on his way to supply drinking water to a community

Late 2017, I had an idea, in fact, a burning desire to reach young entrepreneurs who were still in school, specifically, in the university. I shared this idea with friends and mentors, and with their input, we decided to begin.

We called it the Students Entrepreneurs Conference. The first session held in January of that year. Some of my friends like James Okina, Triumph Onah, Isima Odeh, and Ola Mamora were speakers; these were young people who had done well in business or social entrepreneurship. The goal was for them to share their experiences and lessons with these young folks, and we then go further to empower them (with finances and resources).

Did we fail? Not really. Did we succeed? Not exactly. We shared experiences and lessons, but we did not empower. However, in reality, by the end of 2018, we had directly reached hundreds of young people from 33 universities in Nigeria, Ghana, and Kenya. Indirectly we had reached 20,000+ people (our contents were distributed across other platforms primarily through social media). We had the last session in November 2018, and we stopped. We stopped for a reason. The initial plan was to run this thing for a year by the way, but I got a lot of nudges to continue. I would have. I should have. But I decided not to. My philosophy about social entrepreneurship drove this decision, and that’s what this article is really about.

Running a social project in Africa is one of the most challenging endeavours that can be undertaken by a young person. And I think we don’t do it the right way; our models are not sustainable. I don’t believe you can run many successful social endeavours over the long term without a primary source of finance. I mean in-house resource generation. Social enterprises are not free to undertake; neither are they cheap. You cannot rely on external sources to run a social project for the long term.

Interestingly, our brightest minds drift towards social entrepreneurship. It is beautiful but it’s also detrimental to the continent if not done properly. Our brilliant minds must find ways to create profit-generating entities that can fuel their social projects for the long term. That is what Africa needs the most. If we all do social entrepreneurship, who will fund us? This reliance on external funding puts us back at asking for help, and then we repeat the cycle.

For instance, you and your team can get into the recycling business or develop valuable skills like graphic design, software development, painting, sewing, etc, and sell.

Bills and Melinda Gates Foundation HQ

Did you know that Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation invest some of their endowments? Most of the funding received is in shares or investment assets. With this model, profits from stocks and investments are used for social projects, so there’s a money generating wheel that sustains the social enterprise.

Even Jesus who was the most significant social entrepreneur knew how important a primary source of income was. He had women of considerable means who were part of his team, including Mary Magdalene and Joanna.

My point exactly is that our brightest minds cannot entirely focus on social entrepreneurship. Let’s build profit-generating enterprises and then channel that profit into sustainable social enterprises or put it at the forefront of our current model. That way it’s a win-win for us all, and it will last.

Meanwhile, I’d like to thank a few of the numerous people who made SEC close to a success; Chris Emeodi, Uncle Barnabas, Tola Okodugha, Bukhari Olokodana, Anjola Ndubuisi, Uncle Osas, Daniel Nwachukwu, Gabriella Osemwegie, Anu Awe, James Okina, Triumph Onah, and many others I wish I could add to this very short list. You guys are a real gift to this world.