They say never put your eggs in one basket.
But this is exactly what Phuti Seroto from Chebeng village near Polokwane did during the lockdown that paralysed many businesses, particularly small medium and micro businesses.
Seroto runs a chicken farm in the village and when other businesses were crumbling as the lockdown continued to bite and the government dragged its feet in helping small businesses, his business continued to boom.
“Chicken is one of the most consumed meat products in the world,” Seroto told Vutivi News.
“People eat a lot of chicken, and because movement to town was restricted, it became necessary for people in the village to buy chickens from me,” he said.
From the beginning of the lockdown until level 2, chickens from his poultry farm had been flying off the proverbial shelves.
Although Seroto works for the University of Limpopo, his passion lies deep in the heart of chicken farming.
His business entity, Ditareng Logistics and Projects, has been operating in the poultry sector since 2006.
Seroto is also a pastor at the General United Apostolic Churches of God in South Africa.
He prides himself for having focused on poultry and for this reason the pandemic did not affect his business.
“My chickens are mostly bought during winter and summer, and business went on as usual, even though around me businesses were suffering,” he said.
He might not have been hit by the pandemic but he felt very strongly about how small businesses have been severely affected.
“Small businesses tend to be vulnerable during an economic crisis, in part because they have fewer resources with which to adapt to a changing context.
“Small businesses help to drive economic growth, create employment, and are sources of innovation and new ideas. As we know, for various reasons South Africa’s large businesses have not been creating jobs on the scale needed to lower the unemployment rate,” Seroto adds.
Although he did not receive government assistance during the pandemic because his business wasn’t struggling, he felt like more could be done by the government.
“There is a need for further research to build a more research-based entrepreneurial knowledge system that will provide empirical evidence of the effects of factors that impact on entrepreneurial behaviour, performance and effectiveness,” he said.
“The government should have a lot of good research in this country as money has often been spent for the small-scale sector in a random trial and error manner, succeeding or failing based more on luck than through informed decisions.”
