On 13th September 2022, the ‘Small Package Exporter Champions (SPEC)’ Programme, initiated under the Workstream 2: e-Trade Portal Development and Promotion of the SeT4SME Project hosted a match making event to introduce 12 mentors to the 15 silver certified SPEC members. The mentors will provide 3-month tailored mentorship consisting of 6 different sessions that runs until November.
The event was organized by the Alliance, through Swisscontact, Khmer Enterprise, and EuroCham in collaboration with the Ministry of Commerce and Cambodia Women Entrepreneurs Association (CWEA). The event also featured Silver SPEC Certificate Award to celebrate the achievements of the 15 SME (Small and Medium Enterprises) businesses who have taken part in our SPEC program and completed the last training on E-Commerce Platforms for SMEs; Logistics Documentation “Need to Know”; and Product Design for Export Markets.
During the event, the attendants were also informed about the mentorship program, the formats, and the mentor – mentee journal, followed by a joint exercise for mentor and mentees to work on their objectives and set up a timetable and make presentations from SPEC members on their objectives. The networking reception at the end of the event turned out to be a sociable and enjoyable evening.
Following the silver certification, the SPEC initiative will commence the 3-month mentorship of 6 different sessions that runs until November. SPEC Mentees will be able to gain new insights from Mentors who has years of experiences in export-related fields, pre-selected by the SPEC Committee (consisting of EuroCham, Swisscontact, Khmer Enterprise, and Cambodia Women Entrepreneur Association) to cater best to their needs. Mentors are selected based on their expertise and experience in addressing the pain points and needs expressed by the mentees.
The topics to be covered by the mentorship program includes product development and packaging design; export rules and processes, documentation processes, certification process and guidance on related/applied tax and regulation. It also focuses on branding; digital marketing; using of cross-border e-commerce platforms for exports; supply chain management; and finding international buyers and markets.
The workshop was covered by the following media:
Improving Small Package E-Trade for SMEs (SeT4SME) is a two-year project (2021-2023) of the Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation (the Alliance), implemented by Swisscontact in partnership with Ministry of Commerce (MoC), and with the collaboration of the General Department of Customs and Excise (GDCE), Cambodia Post, The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and Cambodian Women Entrepreneurs Association (CWEA).