Coca-Cola, ministry team up to empower micro entrepreneurs

PUTRAJAYA: Coca-Cola Malaysia is coming together with the Ministry of Domestic Trade,Cooperatives and Consumerism to economically empower 20,000 micro business entrepreneurs by 2020.
Under the “Coca-Cola Komuniti Usahaan” programme, the beverage company will provide essential business training, in the areas of starting a new business, keeping daily records, managing income and expenses, managing cash flow and credit, and managing quality and service. The ministry will provide consultation on business regulation and micro-financing.
This year alone, the programme targets some 14,000 participants, especially budding small-scale entrepreneurs, women and university students.
Women are the main target group for the programme owing to the fact that one in five small and medium enterprises are owned by women, many of which appears to be micro-businesses which contributed about 25% to Malaysia’s gross domestic product last year.
The initiative is in line with Coca-Cola’s global initiative of economically empowering five million women entrepreneurs across the group’s value chain by 2020, which is being undertaken in 13 countries.
Coca-Cola Bottlers Malaysia Sdn Bhd CEO Stephen Lusk said the company recognises the importance of empowering women as well as men to maximise their income sources which will have a powerful and positive impact on the community. The programme will also be introduced in 14 local public universities, where up to 1,000 students of each institute will have access to the training.
The ministry will be conducting road tours to promote the programme.