Mr. Joseph Patrick, from the DREN Atsinanana, in Madagascar, whom we trained in 2015, facilitated two training courses for women on how to set up and manage a microbusiness. This project is in partnership with the organisation Humanité Inclusion to help parents of children with disabilities to send the latter to school through income-generating activities. The first training took place in Mahanoro (east coast of Madagascar, Atsinanana Region) from February 19 to 21, 2025 and 25 participants (21 women and 4 men) were trained.
Patrick used and adapted a+b=3’s module 5 on how to set up and manage a microbusiness by adding the module on prioritising expenses to help participants not only to separate personal expenses from those of their business, but also to manage their personal and family expenses well. Module 5 includes among others: the use of goal cards, the story of Esongo (an entrepreneur who makes and sells soaps) and a game on business ideas, separating business and personal expenses, consequences of not keeping accounts, calculating profit, managing loan repayments, practical advice on managing expenses, how much to pay yourself, family and business, developing your business. Several parents already have a micro-enterprise and found this practical training very useful, in particular, to improve the management of their business: recording the inflows and outflows of money, reconciling the cash register each day.
Patrick also trained a second group of 12 parents (mothers) from a public school in Vavatenina in the Analanjorofo region from February 24 to 26, using Module 5. “Homework” was given after each day of training, to encourage the participants to immediately put into practice what they had just learned. In addition, tests were carried out before and after the training: at the end of the training, more than 10 participants understood money management and entrepreneurship while none had responded just before the training. More than 75% of the participants have the ability to define a business idea, list the materials to create an income-generating activity, identify working capital needs, calculate the capital needed to create and run the business. The only technical point that was only assimilated by 33% of the participants is the calculation of the sales forecast, which is the most difficult point of the training. The participants were dynamic and very satisfied with the practical learning of the training. They all attended the three days and expressed the wish to have personalised follow-up and to participate in other training on this topic which is at the heart of their lives. Thanks to the Humanité Inclusion organisation, the DREN of Atsinanana and Mr. Patrick Joseph.
