Professional services firm EY is in the process of unveiling contenders drawn from more than three dozen countries for its annual Entrepreneur of the Year award. Covering the event as EY’s then media partner, attending the final was a highlight of those years for me. Notably in 2006, when sitting with the late Bill Lynch of Imperial when he won the global crown.
Last night, EY named Maritzburg University graduate Craig Irvine as the entrepreneur who will carry SA’s flag during the final in Monaco next year. The Johannesburg-based head of poultry group Irvine’s Africa is the third generation leader of the family business. It has deep roots in Zimbabwe where Craig’s father runs the company’s primary breeding operation.
Irvine’s victory is testament to out-of-the-box thinking all successful entrepreneurs require – especially those who operate in tough geographies. Although it does deliver chicken meat into Zim and neighbouring countries, the company’s biggest line is millions of day-old chickens sold to 16,000 fellow entrepreneurs in 20 African countries.
Irvine describes his customers as “the real entrepreneurs… they beat the odds every day, overcoming power cuts, no access to capital and a generally hostile environment to grow the chicks into saleable birds.” Another example of abundant entrepreneurial spirit embedded in Africa. As the world will surely witness when dogmatic politicians eventually get out of the way and allow the continent’s latent human potential to be unleashed.
