The International Workers' Day is celebrated worldwide on May 1st, and it is a public holiday. This day commemorates the struggle of workers for better wages and working conditions, and it is marked with parade speeches and celebrations nationwide. The aim of the holiday is to recognize workers' contribution to the development of the nation and to encourage them to work harder towards achieving greater progress. Now the General Secretary of the Private Telecoms and Communications Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, Texan, Abdullai Okono joins me now to discuss further on the welfare of Nigerians. Happy Workers' Day to you, Abdullai. Thank you. Yes, it is indeed my pleasure to have you here. Let's talk about the Workers' Day in Nigeria. We've been celebrating since 1980, and the different governments have come and gone. Can you say that the workers have been actually given the right place as it should be here in Nigeria? Thank you so much once again for having me. It's my pleasure to always be on your show. Yeah, it's actually... I want to say that the workers in Nigeria have not really been given their rightful place. Though we have to be objective about it all, we get to see that virtually everywhere in every part of the world, workers are not really given their due recognition. But as you know, it is embedded in the cycle of workers to always foster their way into the scheme of things. So workers are not given their due place, like I said earlier, but as you know, that's where we get the work, Alutakontuna, Victoria, Sata, that's where it comes in. That is, we keep struggling, we keep demanding for what is due to us. So in Nigeria, Nigeria is also not an exception. We have to be striving, we have to be struggling, we have to be fighting to be here and we will continue to do that. All right, two about Nigerian workers. May 1, every day, there are parades all over the country. President, state governors give speeches, even the Niger Label Congress goes out for parades across the various state capitals. But this year, it is a year where there will be a new administration sometime this month, as it's where this month of May. But the question right now would be, would you say that over time the issue of minimum wage and welfare of workers have actually been addressed? Because after much workers' wages or their wage was actually increased to 30,000 in Nigeria. And this year, this present administration also promised to increase workers' pay by 40%, despite the fact that inflation has increased by 85%. How did you really greet this development, the planned increment of workers' salaries? Okay, thank you so much. The planned increment of salary by 40% as announced by the Buhari administration is a work on development. Like we say in the local parlance, look for bread is better than nothing, you know. So it's a work on development, but we have the opinion that yes, the government can do far better than that, just based on what you just asserted now, that inflation rate is over 80%. But that means the increment is not commensurate to the inflation rate. Perhaps I want to believe that by the time the organized labor sit down with the government, they will reason with us and they do the needful, rather than giving us 40%, they will make it at least that 80% that you just mentioned about. Yes. Alright, through talking about workers' welfare, most people still have issues of unionization at places where they work and over time we've had issues of unfriendly labor practices and more treatments of workers just because they want to be unionized, but most of the organizations or some organizations are saying that they cannot do that. So how would labor come in or how has labor fed in this particular issue where workers actually denied what is due to them because their employers don't want them to unionize? It has not been easy actually, I must let you know. In terms of unionization of workers in Nigeria, it interests you to know that the government is even doing far better than the private sector. The public sector is doing a lot better than the private sector. In the private sector it has always been in talk of war, but I can assure you that we are not relenting. We are not relenting, it has not been easy doing. And they are almost majorly, these employers in the private sector, they ride on the fact that a lot of workers are always very busy, they are always frightened, they are afraid of associating with the union. When you meet with them, they tell you that yes, unionism is the best way, unions are there to protect us, they will fight for our rights, they will improve our welfare, we will work, but yet they will tell you that I don't want to be sacked, I don't want to lose my job. But what we always tell them is that even if you do not associate yourself with a union, you have always been experiencing sacks, incessant harassment, intimidation and all what not. So we keep encouraging them to do so. But another important thing again, from what you just said now, yes we hear it, but we have not really seen evidential document backing it up, where an employer will tell the state categorically, black and white, that his employees should not join a union in their sector. If we are able to see that you want to employ you, in case you have any company in that regard, or workers that are experiencing such, please bring it to our mouties, who so much appreciate who have that. And if you can lay a hand on just one employer to serve as a deterrent to others, we will make sure that we use such an employer as a scapegoat. So to go back to your question properly again, is that it has not been easy, it has not been an easy task at all, but we have been pushing it. At this point, I also want to implore the Ministry of Labor, who is the supervising ministry pertaining to labor and the productivity in the country, to also sit up, because a lot of them, when issues arise, and there is a need for their intervention, it does not really come as quick as it should be. So this is part of the reasons why these employer players in the private sector seem to be having a huge day. But I can assure you that trade unions in the private sector, they are not resting on their whores, they are working so hard to make sure that the workers, irrespective of their status, and their designation are unionized. All right. Blah, over time, we have talked about some issues, specifically in your sector, which is the telecommunication sector. Over time, we've seen big telecoms of giants here in the country, international ones, who are residents here in the country. Over time, the big positions, as it were, are given to expatriate, while Nigerians, who are also capable, are actually pushed to the background. What has the NLC or your unions done to address such issues? Thank you so much for this question. Our union has been doing a great lot in this regard, and I can assure you that to a very large extent, though we may not want to over exaggerate things within the sector that we have eradicated totally, we have not been able to do so. But I can assure you that maybe 100% as it used to be, we have reduced it to the barest minimum, say below 40%. It has not been easy, you know, but I tell you that we are really buckling it. We are working assiduously to ensure that things are not done. Because all multinationals, they must abide by our laws, especially when it has to do with expatriate quota policy, which stipulates that for every expatriate that will be coming into the country, there must be three Nigerians attached to such expatriates. So, and apart from that also, there must be a need, meaning that the expatriates must be seen in Nigeria or must be absent rather from Nigeria. That is to say that Nigerians do not have that prerequisite qualification to do the task before such an expatriate can come down to Nigeria. And once the expatriate is here in Nigeria, three Nigerians must be attached to such expatriates. For him, I mean, for the expatriate to put them up to speed, to train them such that when it leaves, they will have enough hands to take over such a rules. Private telecommunications and communication services of Nigeria will be doing a lot. I can, for, I'm sure you may not be comfortable with me mentioning names, but I can assure you that there are some companies that we are aware of that we have tackled and we have ensured that such expatriates live in Nigeria for good. All right. I want to understand what the Nigerian label laws, what they say concerning the issue of casualization of workers because it still is, it is still an issue here in the country where most people are just working on temporary basis or they are seen as casual staff and they are not getting the fringe benefit or the entitlement that they should be getting when they actually do so much work. So what does the law says, what does it, sorry, say, about the issue of casualization of workers in the country? You asked me, like you just did now, Justin, I'll tell you that I'm not sure the Nigerian law is so protective of employees because in some aspect of our liberal activities go through, they will tell you that there are temporary, there can't be temporary employment and permanent employment, you know, meaning that they give room for these employers to hide under heat, to give some people temporary employment. But by our large, the laws, our laws pertaining to liberal have been reviewed and hopefully a lot of these misgivings or the shortcomings that we have noticed would be rectified everywhere in the world. But the liberal movement from arts or from against casualization. Casualization is one thing that should not be encouraged but another thing, one important thing I need to mention is that in this country of us now, people are now, employers are now hiding under outsourcing, determined as outsourcing, but in reality the way it plays out with the carry out the process, you see that it's actually a case of a casualization. We have a company presently which we are tackling, which we have, and thanks to your station that you did a bid for us in publicizing it, we shall be embarking on a three-day warning strike, effective Tuesday, that is the day tomorrow, that is the day after the workers' day. So in this company they tell you that they are outsourcing, getting projects from the telcos and for them to win those projects, they have given the impression to the telcos that yes, they have the way without to manage the, I mean to take, I mean to do the project effectively, meaning that they also have the personnel that can carry out those work, but what you notice is that in turn they also now subcontracts to other commercial companies, then these commercial companies also in turn will now hand them over to another set of companies and you get to ask these workers that who are your employers, and the workers grown up for goodness sake, they will be telling you that they do not really know who their employers are. In some instances you see that the employers, some companies will be the ones that will be paying their allowances and the other will be paying their salaries. So these are some of the things we are tackling this company on, we are taking the Huawei Technologies on and we will not be rest until things are done normally. We cannot just come from all the way from Asia and be enslaving our people in this country. It is a no-no, it is something we will fight them to stand still to ensure it is eradicated in that company. Then apart from Huawei Technologies, Nigeria Limited, other companies within the sector also, we are beaming our searchlights in them, but we are starting with Huawei.  Alright, it is May Day celebration right now. So what is the hope of the average worker in Nigeria in 2023 at a time where they go to the markets today to buy maybe just rice and the next day they go to the same market and the price has actually doubled. As we celebrate May Day, as we celebrate International Workers' Day, what is the future for the Nigerian worker? Is there any hope as we celebrate and is there any reason to even celebrate Workers' Day? Thank you so much, Justin. On this, I will say that as long as there is life, there is always hope. Nigerian workers should be hopeful that things will get better, things will get improved. Before now, we are talking about less than about several thousand five hundred minimum wage and today we are talking about 30% and this government has also announced that 40% increment will be done and that is we have not even sat down with them to negotiate a new minimum wage, but on their own, considering the fact that for them to have recognized the type of inflation that we experience in the country, they have proposed that 40% will be increased in the wages. So by the time we meet with them, we negotiate, obviously we have to do something higher than the 40% that they have proposed right now. So in all of these, there is hope. As long as we are alive, there is always hope. All right, I must say very big thank you to you. I have been speaking with Abdulai Okono, he is the general secretary of the Private Telecommunications and Communications Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, Texan. Thanks for joining us and this May Day celebration. Thank you so much for having me. And just before we go on the show, there is a knowledge gap and information in Africa. And as such, people need to understand that what they need to do and apply information to create wealth. This form part of this course at the Wealth Creation Summit organized by Knowledge Digest Africa where speakers from around the world details in this report. And I'll see you again tomorrow. My name is Justin Akadoni. Many thanks for watching. Thank you. So I believe in mentorship or grassroots because I know that if the curriculum can be restructured, many people are going to understand entrepreneurship, management of skills and all of that which basically is not happening currently in the curriculum of our country in Nigeria and in many part of the African country. And that's what we are trying to do to bring knowledge closer with practical experience. It looks informal but has a lot of detail about giving results. In the Caution Center on starting and growing business, monetizing digital skills as well as tech innovation for productivity and profitability at work. Entrepreneurs are also advised to have a good knowledge of what they want to do. I mean, before you go into putting money into cryptocurrency, do you understand what cryptocurrency is? Do you have the skill and the education required to actually put your money into that? I always advise people, start by knowing what you want to put your money into. There are so many platforms where you can invest money because if you are going into forest market, we are trading 6.6 trillion every day and you don't want to go in there and just throw money as well. Start by learning. My coming here is to bring practical experience, is to bring what I would call walking information that can help these young minds transform the mind. It's really a mind game. Once the mind can be transformed and that base of it, that grass root that background of it, it's going to change everything. Young people are well represented at the summit and the academics are speaking on the essence of being future ready by bringing the town and gown together in the co-production of the college. The essence of the our goal is to produce human resources for those in the industry. But there seem, from what you have seen in the past there seem to be a gulf because sometimes we have seen employers complaining about, they talk about the quality, it's not the quality of the graduate passing, but they are talking about those graduates that are work ready that are employment ready and that's why we thought that for us to be able to achieve that, the two must come together. Find and show that despite geopolitical and economic destabilizers such as inflation and Russia's invasion of Ukraine, approximately 80 trillion US dollars in new wealth is likely to be created over the next five years.


another SPAC. What's up money geeks Mr. V here. Welcome to another video guys. So in today's video we're going to talk about ticket symbol APXT. This is Apex Technology Acquisition which is a blank check company that's in the process of taking AFPOIN public. So AFPOIN is a software as a service or SaaS company that provides the migration management and security of Microsoft 360 cloud solutions as well as their SharePoint data for different customers. So if you look at it from this perspective you have Microsoft 360 solutions over here. You have customers over here AFPOIN bridges that gap between the two providing them that kind of a migration management and security of their data. So it's I mean to me it's a good solution that is out there. I just worry that what if Microsoft decides to create their own solution. But before we get started and look in details of AFPOIN if you're new to the channel we talk about how to earn money, how to save money, how to invest and build wealth. So if that's something that interests you go ahead and hit that subscribe button and your notification bell so you don't miss out on new content. So let's take a look here at AFPOIN. Again if you just go through your website here it's a company that provides a cloud-based solution for migration management and protection of Microsoft 360 and SharePoint data across enterprises. So they are kind of a bridge like I mentioned earlier for the solution. So if we take a similar solution here that we have profiled on the channel if we look at Jamf which does the same thing provides a similar solution but on the Apple site. So it does pretty much the same thing but for Apple products. So they went public just this past July and when they went public they started trading at about $39 and they see a high of about $41 and some change and since then they've actually gone down and now I'm right sitting at about $30 and some change. AFPOIN it's in that similar both which you are relying solely on Microsoft. So if Microsoft would take a hit in any shape or form this business model right here would crumble. I mean I understand there's a lot of businesses that depend on each other for your survivor but this is again these two companies are solely in existence because of Microsoft and for good reasons Microsoft and Apple have been in business for a very very long time and I don't see them going anywhere anytime soon. The only thing is if Microsoft decides that they want to build an in-house solution that matches this I don't see how AFPOIN can survive that. So that is a potential drawback for the company but besides that they I mean it looks like they're doing great they've been in business since 2001 and operate in like over 14, 88 different countries and so I think they have something that you know Microsoft likes and likes to partner with them and make their life easy. What they do in my opinion is they help Microsoft sell Microsoft's products. So let's just take a look at their investor presentation here that they put together and just see what's there for us. So if we see basically this is Apex technology acquisition these are the CEOs and the people. Again this company doesn't it's just a blank check company so you have a bunch of people come together put money and start a company that the idea here is to go out and find a really good company and take in public so that's what these guys are here doing. So if we look at summary of the transaction that's going to happen here so the market capitalization after this would be the value AFPOIN at about two billion dollars which I mean to me that's that's pretty big for the fact that I mean most people don't even know what AFPOIN does so that is a huge market capitalization two billion dollars so I mean some of their solutions here as far as data management and the reason I know a lot about is because I do work in tech so I understand the overall solution that they are providing here and how it does help organizations you know kind of stay afloat and stay ahead of technology. So again this is the thing that I explained earlier so you have Microsoft solutions here like Office 2 is 365 and then on the other side here you have companies that are operating on enterprises and then AFPOIN comes in there and embrace that gap providing if they need some sort of migration, if they need security management they step in and help provide all those different solutions for them which makes the life of the organization very easy because they don't have to worry about it because you have a third party that's taking care of it so I think to me that is something that you know they do that really gives companies that leverage Microsoft technology an open hand so again this is some of their key advantages you can just kind of read through this and see again from Microsoft cloud focus perspective data protection compliance which is a huge when you're talking about working and having different governments around the world the fact that you have a company that can come in and help with that complaints and then overall scalability and automation which takes away a lot of the repetitive tasks that most people would have to do so that is huge overall if you look at the history here they're looking at hey by 2022 overall digital transformation market would be about 1.8 trillion which man that is a lot of money if you just take a little bite of that apple that is huge and then look at just kind of a customer-based perspective what they're looking at hey major companies here across the board so again based on the fact that or Microsoft has a good hold in the marketplace with your technology based on the fact that these guys have been working with Microsoft since 2001 it gives them a really good advantage and the partnership to me seems to be a great one of financial profile you see here from 2019 all the way to projector 2022 they're looking at you know significant growth of about 30 percent for their revenue and their reoccurring revenue of about 38 percent so that's that's good projections I mean if he holds true then they're sitting pretty good and then again this is just kind of the growth the summary of their revenue profile what I'm mostly interested here is if you look at the total revenue here how it's growing year over year so from 2020 to 2022 projected I mean it's showing like increased growth which is what you want to see for most companies most technology companies and in this stage would probably not be profitable so the fact that they've been showing some sort of you know revenue growth that is showing a good sign of profitability to me that is good because if I said most companies in this state usually tend to invest a lot of their money back in the company to try to for innovation for R&D and so are this company I guess because they've been in business for that long have already taken care of some of the things that we see here so here again there's some a transaction summary of what's going to happen so expected close date I think this is what you guys must be looking at so expected close date would be a Q1 of 2021 so looking forward to that so as of when we were recording this right now APXT is trading at about $10.74 and so we are going to see and that's that moved a little bit after the announcement because before the announcement it was about like maybe like 10 50 then after seeing the media announcement the stock has moved up just a little bit but I mean I don't anticipate seeing a really strong major move here because if I take a similar comparison to a company like Jam F that came out out of the gate strong and then started pulling back I don't anticipate that you know f-point is going to come out and be this wonderful home run this is some potential day but I don't see it being so some sort of a home run just right out of the gate so basically guys again this is a company that relies solely on a specific technology so in this case they rely a lot I mean 100% reliability on Microsoft so if anything would happen to Microsoft these guys are going to be impacted and I said the exact same thing when I profiled Jam F it was these guys depend a lot I mean their business model is built around Apple granted these are top companies and companies that have been in business for a very long time and have shown that they can sustain in the ups and downs of the market so which is good but again to me if Microsoft decides to build an in-house solution to overtake now f-point I don't see how they can stop that just like Jam F the partnership is good I don't anticipate that this stock is going to come out of the gate and just carry it off personally I'm going to sit on the sideline watch this one and see what happens and if I see some potential in there then I might get in I'd rather be late to the party than getting and get burned so I'm going to wait and see what happens and I'm anticipating that on the on the day that they close the deal and you probably see a little spike in in in the stock but other than that I don't anticipate to see like a major move that would really push the stock to as I said 30 40 50 dollars I may be wrong here but that's just my my take because I'm basing this on history looking at jam f so question of the day what do you think about this do you think hey nah this is not groundbreaking technology there's nothing that these guys are doing that it's not out there already or you think hey this might be a great opportunity to to make some money again let me know in the conversation and as always guys if you're looking to get started with investing we both currently doing a promotion where if you sign up right now and deposit 100 dollars you get four free stocks links in the description definitely go check it out when you sign up you get a free stock I get the free stock that's what helps me to continue to put content like this for you guys and as always don't be a greedy savage and stay motivated


what is going on guys welcome back to the channel and I do appreciate you being here today I am back with another destined 2 community highlights video and damn some of these clips are epic!


The story I would like to tell you today is about a lake, a beautiful lake in the middle of the desert in Tombuktu in northern Mali, the Lake Fagibin. This lake was providing livelihoods for different people, for pastoralists, fishermen, for women, for men, for children, and everybody was using the area around the lake. This lake was so important that some NGOs in the 80s decided to protect the edge of the lake with the prosopis. The prosopis tree, I think some people know that, is a very invasive species, but it's also a very drought resistant species. So the lake was suddenly protected with these trees, but what happens in the 90s is that unfortunately this lake dried out. When this lake dried out, people lost their livelihoods, they lost the fishermen, they lost the fish, no agriculture, no pastoralists, and people were struggling how to deal with this change because it was a dramatic environmental change. What happens after that is that the prosopis, of course, took the area of the lake and suddenly we have a forest. So it was a lake and it became a forest. And can you imagine now people who were fishermen suddenly having prosopis forests and they don't know what to do with this forest? That is what we wanted to understand, and we were there as a civil scientist to understand the vulnerability of people but also to understand their adaptive capacity. How do they deal with such a situation? We talked to women, to men, to young people, to old people to understand the kind of the perception of the whole community. The first thing we found out was that the strategy of men is different from the strategy of women because the first thing men did was to migrate here to the mining areas in the southern of the country or in other countries like to Algeria or Mauritania or Libya. This strategy changed the whole structure of the villages because then suddenly we had communities where we had women, some young men, kids and older people. So the whole social structure of the community changed when this strategy happened, when men migrated. So what we saw when we arrived there that women had to take over a lot of activities which were in the past done by men. So we find out that their vulnerability actually increased because they are adapting to two things. They are adapting to the climate variability but they are also adapting to the migration of men which is an adaptive strategy. So we also find out that not only women and men are different but also women were different because some women couldn't take, couldn't do some strategies because they were culturally restricted in their mobility. They couldn't move to this forest, for instance, to use it. And what was interesting, that actually the poorest women in the society were the one who could take advantage of these new resources, of the new ecosystem services which were mostly wood and charcoal. We were not expecting to see that because when you think of vulnerabilities, you think all the poorest is the most vulnerable and we were very surprised to find that it is not true. Then when we looked more in this process we saw that charcoal production was taken by the poorest women and it couldn't be used by other women because these women were in the higher class of the society and they are not able to do charcoal. So suddenly they became the ones who are vulnerable in this new situation while the poorest women could improve their livelihood. They could have increased the food security and decreased their vulnerability so their adaptive capacity was actually in this situation suddenly higher than other groups where they were the marginalized one in the past. So we have a completely shifting in social relations. But what we found also is that even though the women they had these autonomous adaptation strategies the problem where there is a lack of knowledge those women they were all pastoralists or they were farmers and suddenly they have to make charcoal. And we found out that extension services but also other services were not themselves adapted to the change which happened in the society and in the environment. Also in terms of market, the market was very far for those women and they couldn't take advantage of this strategy even though they were engaged in producing charcoal they had to sell it in the market in the village. In terms of lanternery it was the same problem because it's interesting when the lake became a forest the lanternery also changed because forest is under the government while the lake and the lake area was managed by communities so people lost also their access and suddenly those women were illegal using charcoal illegal. What I mean here is that when we think in vulnerabilities that is we need to unveil a lot of complexity at the local level. Communities are not the same they are not a homogeneous group they have different rights, different access and this is what we need to understand deeply if we want to avoid maladaptive actions. We also need to understand the different roles which are related to different social status or ethnic groups if we want to avoid to have also maladaptive actions because we don't understand the pattern of vulnerabilities which also are very dynamic as I showed here. What I want to say here is that when we think landscape we need to think two things they are environmental lives but they are also social lives of landscape and those two lives are very important they are linked to each other and we need always to link them when we think vulnerability adaptation. We need also to overcome fragmentation in the knowledge we need to build bridges between local communities national stakeholders between policy, between project but also always we need to understand the vulnerability at the local level because adaptation happens locally. I choose this picture it's not from the Sahel because I think that this thought or this experience is also maybe interesting for other regions or interesting wherever people interact with nature because we shape nature but also nature shapes social structures, shapes societies and we need always to understand both of them. Thank you very much.


Bad news, role-playing game fans, it turns out that Paper Mario the Origami King is not an RPG. The game contains no experience points, no levelling, and no character progression. Combat involves sliding tiles around within a circular area, creating something more akin to a puzzle game than a role-playing game. While this may disappoint fans of older Paper Mario games, it's not that surprising. The series has been moving in this direction for quite a while. Producer Kensuke Tanabe even once stated, quote, I had actually been thinking for a long time that I wanted to get rid of the RPG experience points. The design for Paper Mario the Origami King was decided on thanks to two unusual influences, Rubik's Cubes, and Tingle from the Legend of Zelda series. No, really. In an Awata asks interview leading up to the release of Paper Mario Sticker Star, Kensuke explains how he and designer Taro Kudo worked together on the DS game, freshly picked Tingles Rosie Rupyland, which was for some reason never released in North America. During development, it was decided that the player character wouldn't level up or develop over time. Instead, they'd simply accrue more and more money, which could be used to solve larger and larger challenges. When the pair started work on Sticker Star, they both agreed that they wanted to carry this mechanic across to Paper Mario. Hence, the game's focus on single-use sticker items instead of giving Mario traditional RPG character progression. Changes in the way the game played were also inspired by fans' feedback. A Club Nintendo survey focusing on Super Paper Mario discovered that only 1% of players reported genuinely enjoying the game's story. Far more popular, according to this survey, was the mechanic of flipping Mario to switch between a 2D and 3D view. Hence, as the series has evolved, Paper Mario has focused increasingly on paper-related gimmicks, such as Origami. Indeed, at one point, Shigeru Miyamoto became obsessed with stripping all of the story out of Paper Mario games entirely, saying, It's fine without a story, so do we really need one? It seems that cooler heads prevailed on this one point at least. Going into Paper Mario the Origami King, the team knew that they wanted some new kind of battle mechanic that didn't involve traditional RPG stats. Naohiko Aoyama, who directed Paper Mario Color Splash, said that he wanted, quote, a battle system in which the enemies surround Mario to attack from all sides. The development team for the Origami King had no idea what to do with this request. They spent a lot of time thinking about how best to implement this in a way that would create an engaging, interesting game. Finally, Kensuke Tanabe had a Eureka moment while he was in the shower. He said, The idea was based on a Rubik's Cube. It inspired me to add vertical rotations to the horizontal rotations, so we got the slide mechanic added to the program and it worked well. That is the moment I was convinced we'd be able to build our battle system. This Rubik's Cube inspired design involved Mario lining up his enemies in order to beat them all up at the same time. Initially, the plan was to use this same mechanic for boss battles, until the team actually started trying to build a boss fight. Then, they realized, when Mario fights a single large enemy, there's nothing to line up. So, the formula was flipped, with the boss in the middle, and Mario working his way through a puzzle before he can fight his opponent. According to Kensuke, the team started out by creating their battle puzzles physically, drawing rings on a whiteboard, and eventually creating mockups with movable panels and arrows that almost looked like a board game. This feels awfully fitting for a game set in a papercraft world. When it came time to actually build this battle system in-game, they could use their physical mockups as reference. It remains to be seen how fans will respond to Paper Mario the Origami King. No doubt fans of Mario role-playing games, already disillusioned thanks to the demise of the Mario and Luigi series, will find this a bitter pill to swallow. That said, there's nothing wrong with trying new things. Sometimes you've got to strike out on your own and do something risky in order to grow. That's as good a moral as any for this particular story. And, hey, if the Origami King isn't really your thing, there's always bug fables. It's better than nothing, right?


Recording in progress. I'm trying to get my screen a little wider so I can get the chat open. But basically what I would like to do is ask everyone here to use that information as presented. Go to menti.com. Yeah. And you can put in the number that you see on that screen. Yes. And you can then start to indicate what country you're from. So how's that going for everyone? So the code there, I'll put in the chat just to make sure everybody gets the code. So you can click on this link if it's easier for you. And you click on that link. You click on that link you should be able to see the country and what code you're from similar to what I'm showing you here. Okay. So how's that going for you guys? Are you putting in your information? Everybody can join in. Everybody join in. Just that's a little bit of a nice breaker. Join in and let's see how it works. So when we do that now, I should be able to indicate if I go back. We should be able to see a little bit of how this works. I should be able to now show you putting in my country code, my country or Trinidad and Tobago. Hopefully you'll see that information coming up on your side as well. You should see a word cloud coming up. And what I'm going to ask you to do as well is go into the chat and put in the information. Where are you from? Who are you? Let's let's hear from you. Who exactly are you? What where are you from? What post are you from? If you're from the, what was the sector you're from? And so on. I'm seeing a few people raising their hands. Would you like to say something? Colleagues were raising their hands. Branca, you like to say something? I'd like to speak. Branca, if you can speak if you want, if you can go ahead and speak if you wish, or you can put it in the chat. I'm from Bosnia, excellent. Other colleagues, please go in the chat and put in where you're from and have a, let's, let's get interactive today. I'll see where you're from, where you're from, where you're from, what post you're from. And let's, let's move forward with this. Yeah. All right, good. It's good to get some information from you guys. So thank you all for assisting us with that icebreaker. And let's continue putting your stuff in the chat and let's now begin, I'm going to stop sharing my screen. And let's now begin by having our colleagues from Zimpost begin the session this morning and this afternoon this evening from wherever you are. Venencia, I believe it's over to you. Thank you. Hello everyone, and welcome to this webinar series. This is Venencia Sigaoke, acting manager, marketing and sales for Zimpost in Zimbabwe. I'm so excited to be making this presentation and it's such an honor for this platform on this webinar series. Allow me to share my screen is on the presentation that I'm going to be making. So as I begin my presentation, I'm going to be focusing on the Zimbabwe more. This is the name that we have given to the e-commerce platform that Zimpost here in Zimbabwe is hosting as a national e-commerce platform. So that's if you want to visit our e-commerce platform, you just write that's our URL www.zimbabwemo.post. So I'm going to be giving you an overview of the Zimbabwe more. If it's achievements, then I'll also allow my colleagues to come in and give an overview of why Zimpost chose the dot post domain to host its e-commerce platform. So the Zimbabwe more allow for those who have got questions. I think soon after my presentation we can then start sharing our questions and we've got a big panel here in Zimbabwe who assist us in responding to some of the questions. So soon after each and every presentation will allow you to ask us questions. So the general overview of the Zimbabwe more. It began as a Zimpost online store in 2017. It was born soon after the instable conference where the digital participation of the postal sector in the digital economy was highlighted and Zimbabwe did not take time to make a decision. We then came back and we then launched the Zimpost online store in 2017. When we launched it, it was only limited to our postal services. That's why we named it a Zimpost online store. But we then saw the opportunity to harness in the digital economy and we then rebranded the Zimpost online store to a national e-commerce platform. And it was then named the Zimbabwe more where government actually launched this e-commerce platform. We saw it as an opportunity for not only postal products to sit on that particular more, but also other retailers macro to small to medium enterprises. And any buyer is allowed to participate in the global economy to actually be able to sit on this more, taking into consideration our capability as far as first mile delivery and last mile delivery is concerned. We then saw it that this was an opportunity for the postal sector to revive the parcel business. That's why we then rebranded it to a national e-commerce platform. And the target beneficiaries for the platform were mainly large corporates who were also now able to register as e-sellers on our platform, small to medium enterprises who would find it difficult to participate in trade globally And we then provided this platform for people to sit on our mall and be able to showcase their ways and sell to the global community and then at the end Zimpost then also offers the last mile delivery of those products and services. So the Zimbabwe more is a game changer. It's an integrated national e-commerce platform that facilitates e-marketplace. We see the postal office as a marketplace where buyers and sellers should just meet because of our expansive branch network and there is no one who can do it better than that other than the post office. And we are an e-fulfillment center where we ensure that in the value chain, we are the logistics giants for the last mile delivery of products that would have been bought online, bought online. It also enables e-payments for people who want to purchase their products globally. They are now able to participate fully and make all their payments more. The platform links domestic retailers with local and global purchases as well as local buyers and small to medium enterprises with the regional and international markets and with the postal distribution and logistics infrastructure, which is already linked to over 1991 countries across the globe. There could be no better opportunity for reviving the postal business other than taping into e-commerce. The Zimbabwe more, it offers a secure customer information. That's why as an organization, when we decided to come up with a national online mall, we had to choose the dot post domain because it's a top local domain. Issues of cybersecurity are of importance, particularly where we are coming from customers where they want to really participate in physically paying for their products and services and to do it online and in order to boost confidence and have quite a number of people participating in online shopping, we had to make sure that as an organization, we also choose a domain that offers this security to our customers. On our products and services that we are currently offering on Zimbabwe mall, they are mainly categorized into four main areas. That's online shopping. These are the services that we have commercialized on our e-commerce platform. Online shopping, online advertising, last mile delivery and warehousing. On the first product line, we felt as an organization that the post office is high time that the post office operates 24-7 and 365, where the post office should be open on a daily basis and every time. And people can only be able to do this by accessing the postal services whilst they are in the comfort of their homes. People should not wait for conventional hours for them to visit a post office and we were saying this is the best opportunity for people to, for the post office to make money whilst even our doors are closed. We then also said the online advertising where different retailers, different organizations are able to showcase their products and services on our e-commerce platform. Because our e-commerce platform is national in nature and sitting on a top level domain, it means that in terms of visibility or search optimization, Zimbabwe mall is one of those sites that you can easily access wherever you are and you access it as quickly as possible. So it's more visible because it's sitting on the top level domain. Being the giant in the logistics services, last mile delivery could be best to be done by a postal organization. So we have customers that are not necessarily even sitting on our mall, but we have integrated their malls with our mall so that we offer last mile delivery, particularly retailers which sell groceries, pharmaceuticals, medicines. We are able to offer last mile delivery as a service and our e-commerce product portfolio. As Zimpost again, we are also able to offer warehousing where we can have products and services coming from global suppliers. We are able to warehouse it in our post offices where we have access space and whenever people then buy online, we then collect from those distribution centers and deliver to people. Thereby reducing even the time frame for a person in the value chain from a point where a person buys a product to when a product is actually delivered because most of the products will be having the warehouse within our post offices where we have access space. So the Zimbabwe mall is sitting on the dot post domain like I mentioned earlier. The dot post domain is hosted by the Universal Postal Union and as Zimpost we decided to go that route because the issues of cybersecurity were of paramount importance to us. We then acquired, on our Zimbabwe mall, we acquired an online shop technology system from Shopify with guidance from the Universal Postal Union again. The online shop software design and customization was done internally by our information technology department through the innovations and business development section where we then also integrated for the payment gateway, we engaged PayNow to be our payment gateway for both local payments and master card and visa payments. PayNow is a payment gateway that accepts most popular electronic payment methods under a single contract. And when we first launched the Zimbabwe mall, the products and services that we initially started selling were philatelic products and they are still the number one products as far as sales are concerned on our mall. Where we have philatelists, our philatelists now being able to access the new stamp issues that would have issued easily on our Zimbabwe mall and we then started adding quite a number of products and services. We now have a number of e-sellers that we have recruited on our e-commerce platform where we now have different categories. I'm sure my colleague Pauline will go through the Zimbabwe mall with all of you and you then be able to see the different product categories that we are currently offering on our Zimbabwe mall. We have a number of e-sellers, we have registered who are sitting on our mall and they are able to sell their products and we then earn a commission from the sales that would have been done by people by these sellers. Once people also buy their products online, we also then offer the last mile delivery, thereby fulfilling the e-fulfillment in the e-value chain on e-commerce. And we are saying as a business, there is no better way for the posts to grow other than this digital platform, particularly on e-commerce, to revive the personal business. So when the Zimbabwe mall project was initiated, the major objectives was to ensure that we establish a secure national e-commerce shopping mall. Like I had mentioned earlier on, people were skeptical to buy online and in order for us to convince them we had to ensure that the platform that we are going to be choosing as an organization provides the highest in terms of security for our customers. So that it boosts confidence in them and then they will be able to transact. The other objective was also to create an open national e-commerce marketplace for domestic and international buyers and sellers to meet on this platform 24-7-365. We are saying as a post office, people should not be restricted in terms of time to access the various products and services that they require in a post office. They should be able to access these services any time of the day, any day of the week, and throughout the year. And most of our products we were saying the way post offices have been located physically should be the same way that the post office should be accessed digitally. This is the platform. A post office is a marketplace where buyers and sellers should just meet to access various products and services without people necessarily traveling long distances. And we are saying once we provide a digital platform, people are also able to get the last mile delivery of that particular product from their nearest post office without people necessarily traveling long distances. And there was no better, we were the best positioned organization to then offer this national e-commerce marketplace for the locals and for e-sellers in the global market. We also saw it as an opportunity to create new business relationships. For example, I've mentioned earlier on that on our platform, we have retailers who are actually, their e-commerce platforms are integrated to our platform. They don't necessarily sit on our platform, but we offer last mile delivery for the products that we have been brought online. During the national lockdowns in COVID-19, we started seeing ourselves growing in that period because we then entered into that space when people were restricted in terms of traveling, our platform became very active. We would buy goods, would buy groceries, would buy medicines online, and our postmen would then deliver these products at their doorsteps, thereby creating new business relationship with retailers that we never thought would be able to have relationships with. We also wanted as an organization to tap into the e-commerce business so that we revive and give a rebirth and transform the postal business. We were saying that mail business has gone down, but we saw e-commerce as the opportunity to grow our parcel business and then to also offer convenience to the transacting public. So to date, most of our achievements to date on Zimbabwe Mall, we have about 138 e-sellers who are actually sitting on our Zimbabwe Mall. And these e-sellers have different product categories that are being offered and people are able to sell on our e-commerce platform and then Zimbabwe Mall offers the last mile delivery. In terms of products that are actually sitting on our Mall, we have about 479 products that are being sold on our e-commerce platform. We have managed to integrate our online shop with other retail giants like OK Zimbabwe, Africa E-Mart, Game Station Care, these are grocery companies. And we also have pharmaceutical companies that are sitting on our Mall and people can buy those products online and then we then deliver both first mile and last mile delivery. We collect from the supplier and we also deliver as a post office. Excuse me. And then the Mall is also available on the World Wide Web and it is accessible to everyone, everywhere. People can visit our Mall and buy their products any time of the day. And this is an achievement where we are bringing convenience to the transacting public. People don't necessarily need to wait for conventional hours of business to start transacting. We have given a new lease of life to our postal business as far as parcel delivery is concerned. We have given a new lease of life to our postmen who are now able to offer door-to-door delivery to the people who would have bought online. The issue of postal density with e-commerce becomes a thing of the past because we are now able to access every household. And as Zimbabwe, what we have done as well in where government has assisted the post office through our regulator. We have managed to set up community information centers where there is a post office, there is a community information center where people have access to internet services. So people, if they do not have smartphones and access to internet, they can visit actually their local post office and visit the Zimbabwe Mall shop online and then have their products delivered wherever they are here in Zimbabwe. In a way, the issue of postal density is also reducing by having Zimbabwe Mall transacting for the different people that we have here because what we only need is a link and data to access the mall. And as Zimbabwe says, well, we have then went a further step to provide this that is in case if people do not have access to internet services. Local products are being showcased on the international market. We have suppliers from tourist to resort towns who used to supply in the global market. They are actually sitting on our mall and they are actually selling their ways, bead, crochet, stone, sculpture, people are able to sell to the global markets, their products and sellers. And particularly the women, the youth, small to medium enterprises have seen this platform as a good platform for them to showcase their ways in the global markets. We have also seen a growth in revenue either from people sitting on the mall, Zimbabwe offering last mile delivery or Zimbabwe offering warehouse and also offering a platform where people can actually advertise their products and services. Other organizations have actually seen it as their distribution center where they actually sit and then sell their ways. So there are a number of achievements that we as an organization have seen by having the Zimbabwe Mall being a national e-commerce platform because it's not only serving the postal business but all the businesses can actually sit on our mall and Zimbabwe has got that advantage as well because of our expensive distribution network to offer the last mile delivery, thereby offering a fulfillment center. We are saying here in Zimbabwe e-commerce has enabled the postal office to become an e-market place, a fulfillment center, a supermarket of services and products because at the end of the day we then offer both first mile and last mile delivery of products and services that have been bought online. And the key to e-commerce is the issue of security, the issue of visibility and the issue of access and Zimbabwe has been active in all these three areas. I'm sure my co-presenters will come in to elaborate more issues with regards to security. As far as customers are concerned they want to make sure that they transact on a platform where they feel secure for their funds and they also want to transact for them to be able to transact the issues of access should then be resolved. With the help of government we've managed to set up community information centers and containerized village information centers where we do not have a post office for people to have access to internet so that we are leaving no one behind in order to bridge this digital divide. Thank you so much. I think my co-presenters will present, will take you through the actual Zimbabwe more and the issue of why Zimbabwe post chose to sit on the dot post domain. Thank you so much. Just one second. Thank you very much, financier. We have actually a couple of questions before you leave. Mozambique has raised their hand in the chat. I'm not sure if they would like to take the floor to speak. I see they've put their hand down. So if not, there's a question in the chat in the Q&A box. I'm hoping that Zimpos is reading the question. If you'd like, would you like me to read it out loud for you? Or would you want to answer it using the Q&A box? The next question is how local e-commerce market, how local e-commerce market in Zimbabwe, I think maybe it's what is local e-commerce market in Zimbabwe status. Maybe the question is trying to say, is Zimbabwe mall dot post competing with that sector? And then another question, how Zimbabwe post does last mile delivery in upcountry, I believe, and how do you resolve the problem of addressing the addressing problem which is common in all of Africa? Does Zimbabwe post implement crowd logistics in its last mile delivery? And what are the challenges you're faced in implementation of Zimbabwe mall dot post? And how Zimbabwe mall works with these globally commerce platforms? So I think you can answer that in the chat box and if you wish to answer it now. And there's another question is coming in. 479 products of 158 sellers on Zimbabwe mall. Or is it that Zimbabwe has imposed itself a seller as well? Another question is coming in in the chat. How long did it take to set up the platform? Thank you so much. So maybe the first question is on how local e-commerce. Don't think we're hearing you if you're speaking. Penencia, is someone speaking? Hello, can you hear me now? Yes, we can hear you now. Okay, thank you. So in terms of market share, I think I'll be able to share the analytics also during the course of the presentation. But in terms of adoption, even within the market, you'd find that e-commerce in terms of penetration, which is still very low. I mentioned earlier on that people are skeptical to buy things online. And I think the way we actually saw an increase in the adoption of e-commerce was during COVID-19 when we had restrictions. So you'd find that people had no option than to go to e-commerce. It then assisted in people actually embracing e-commerce. So those people we embraced e-commerce during that period are more or less most of the customers that we are actually currently setting feedback and their needs. I think you may have to turn off your speaker while you're speaking. So in terms of embracing e-commerce from quite a number of people, you then find that there's still need for more marketing efforts to be done in order for people to actually embrace online shopping. Then on the other questions, the second question was, is Mabuemaw dot post get a competition with that sector? So e-commerce, you'd find that a number of organizations are actually embracing online shopping. And what has been happening is that we have a number of organizations that are creating their online shops and then they sell their products online. But the nature of the e-commerce platform for Zimbabwe, which is the Zimbabwe mall, it's national in nature in the sense that it cuts across all sectors of the economy and people can freely sit on those malls. And what we have been doing, we have been now also integrating with people who already have e-commerce platforms to actually sit on our platform because we are saying that in the value chain on online shopping, there is no organization that can do logistics better than the post office. This is a digitalized parcel delivery of products that we used to have traditionally and the post office is the best in offering that service provision. So you then find that our competition is a bit different where we have other organizations costing their own e-commerce platform. But the Zimbabwe mall is more like a national e-commerce platform that both sell their own postal products as well as any other products that people wish to buy online from wherever they are and we then offer the logistic side of the business as well. So you then find that the competition will be a bit different from the current e-commerce service providers who are currently in the market because they may be offering a platform that offers a certain product line or they are covering a certain sector of the economy. But we are saying ours is a national e-commerce platform where everyone we should then be able to have a universal services nature in it. Then the second question was how Zimbabwe posts do last mile delivery in up country and how do you resolve the problem of addressing which is common in all Africa. So currently what we have been doing in terms of delivery, door to door delivery is done in urban areas and in rural areas when the products have actually arrived, people come and collect at the post office because you then find that some areas are also inaccessible. So door to door delivery is mainly in urban areas but in rural setups, people come and collect their products and their goods at the local post office. Then the third question was does Zimbabwe post implement the cloud logistics in last mile delivery. I think on this one let me allow e-commerce executives to just come in. Okay, thank you very much. Normally on deliveries, we also involve crowdsourcing model, especially when the deliveries are beyond our reach. We have delivery areas that we go but if that area is outside our delivery area, we also empower shippers or other grocery stores. We dodge the middlemen and directly reach out to temporary or part time delivery executives so that we don't disturb the flow of deliveries. So to keep things in perspective, it's just a matter of riding hailing surfaces where we don't have the vehicles, we use other people's vehicles for delivery. Thank you. Through partnerships. Sorry, I think I lost some questions when I was booted out, but there's a question which is saying attract your sellers to join the platform and sell their products. There's a constant problem of sellers asking us how is our traffic and they want us to inquire to sell their products. Sorry, I think I'm also sure in terms of clarity on this question, but what I'm observing is that how do we attract the sellers to actually sit on our mall. One of the business model that we have taken as a post is that we already have existing customers for postal products, where we are offering convenience for them to access their products, anyway, anytime in the country. So you then find that that market as well is now also able to access any other products, for example, agents and government business, people don't necessarily need to wait, we've got a product that we offer for motor vehicle licensing. I think you don't need to wait for, for us to open our business at eight o'clock and then close our post office at 430 for you to be accessed to access your licensing. You can do it online, and then the postman delivers it to you. You can see that this range of products and services where we are saying we are not limiting our e-commerce platform to post our products only, allows the e-commerce platform to also have the competitive advantage where in terms of marketing, it's not so difficult because what we have basically done is, as much as the retailer giant already has got existing clients, and if okay much sits on our platform, we are also then our efforts in terms of marketing are aided by the marketing efforts that already exist in the brand for the e-seller that we have recruited. So you then find that our marketing and convincing of customers is that people come on our platform to access different products from different service providers, thereby making, thereby giving it that reach, which is not necessarily done by us, but also by our partners and also their, how the brand has already been existing in the market. If they already have got a market share, a huge market share, once they come on board on our platform, in terms of marketing, the people, in terms of adoption, it's easy to then reach out to those customers that are already existing and also to have new customers coming on board. But like I said earlier on, we have not yet reached these standards where we want to reach as far as e-commerce is concerned, there is really still need for more effort to actually have people adapting to e-commerce because you find that the issue of embracing e-commerce is still in its infancy, particularly here in Africa, like some have alluded to earlier on. So they still really need more effort to be put in place, but what is critical is the business model that you choose to be supporting this e-commerce platform where you don't necessarily have to be a poster e-commerce platform, but you open it to the market and you then ride on the existing benefits from the other service providers. Then there is a question which is saying, please, how are you dealing with custom duty charges on cross-border e-commerce? Is it paid along with the order or packets are assessed and duty fixed on arrival to zoom posts? So on this one, let me also allow our e-commerce executive on the day today so that she elaborates more and give you advice on this one. Okay, thank you very much. Our platform, I'm going to elaborate on that one on my next presentation, but the platform charges the items, then they charge the shipping cost, but the shipping cost doesn't include the custom duty charges. Custom duty charges are assessed, the packets are assessed and fixed on arrival to zoom posts. They are separate, so they are charged at the Office of Exchange. So, Anne, please. Okay. All right. So I think in terms of questions, I'm not so sure if I've left anything. I think you could proceed now with the next part of the presentation. Yeah, and just one point, when you present, can you go into full screen mode when you present? So that's because what you had shown before was showing your screen where you had the next slide coming up, so if you just go to presentation mode, full screen mode. Okay, that's it. Okay, can you see my screen? Yes, but if you just click slideshow now, let's see if it goes into full screen. Okay, thank you. So this is our website URL for one. The Zimbabwe remote system provides users with an integrated platform offers free e-sale registration. Advertising and last mail delivery. And it acts as a key interchanger protocol. Hi Zimpos, I believe there's some challenges with your audio. It seems that you're bound with maybe a little low. Network interruption. Okay. That's understandable.  Thanks everyone for your patience while the resource on technical issues. Thank you. If someone is speaking, we're not hearing you so well. I don't think we heard what you said. Can you type it in the chat maybe? Thank you. My name is Golden Jason. I'm the ICT infrastructure manager for Zimpos Track Activities. Let me try to see my screen. Okay, is it visible on your side? Yep, it's visible. Okay. So I'm going to present on why Zimpos chose the post platform. We embarked on this journey as opposed to conducting a wide research which involved reading widely. This was around 2013-2014. We noted that a survey was conducted by UPU and it showed that post offices worldwide had developed at least 55 types of postal e-services over the past 20 years. More than 70% of the world posts indicated that electronic services were strategically important to the postal business. So the postal e-services would continue to develop and the UPU world postal strategy had taken this important development into account. On the 25th Universal Postal Union Congress which was held in 2012, I gave birth to the post group and as an organization, we looked at the group. I believe we've lost audio. We've lost Mr Chizi. Is anyone else from Zimpos on the line? And then see Pauline. I think he's coming back in now. Mr Chizi, are you still there? Okay, there was the network interaction. Okay. Okay, let me reset the screen and proceed. We are seeing your screen now. Can you see my screen now? Yes, we are. Yes. Okay, can you see my screen now? Yes, we are. Yes. Go ahead. Please proceed. Okay, so as an organization, we looked at the post group. Okay. As an organization, we looked at the post group. As an organization, we looked at the post group and what it did to offer to the market, to the post. And we realized that the post intends to bridge the digital divide by creating a secure platform that enables postal e-services to be delivered. It also intended to make the search engines for the postal services when the internet to become much more easier. It also acted as a bridge that created... It also acted as a bridge between the traditional physical mail services and the new electronic ones. The domain also could facilitate the entry for developing countries onto the realm of electronic postal services. We also noted that new services could be developed or for a secure environment across the borders. The postal brand will also be strengthened, modernized and made instantly recognizable on the web. On the security checks, which we did, we noted that the dot post platform is considered to be more secure than other domains because it is the first sponsored to play for domain to utilize the domain name system security extension. A set of codes for setting the domain name system that the global database system that translates the computer's fully qualified domain name into an internet protocol address. The security extension also helps to present phishing and other cyber security crimes by assigning and authenticating legitimate websites. It also makes use of public key cryptography which is incorporated in the DNS hierarchy to form a chain of trust originating at the root zone. Genesic is also crucial to the dot post platform as the UPU aims to build a secure trusted space on the internet for e-commerce, e-government, electronic postal services provided by the postal industry. Using the dot post genetic domain names is crucial for any postal organization that conducts highly sensitive data transactions on their website or ones that will ensure traffic to their legitimate website and not a scam one. There are designated postal operators in developing countries and still in the process of digitalizing processes and services. It is very difficult to set aside a budget for securing our e-commerce platform and we saw it prudent to utilize the dot post platform. This also comes with all the security prerequisites for integration with online payment gateway solutions such as PayNow. Having done all the checks above, we noted that the dot post provides the necessary platform for zoom post to develop other business opportunities and increase its visibility on the global market. I therefore recommended that zoom post join the dot post group to learn more about dot post and e-commerce as well as take advantage of the subsidized fees. In October of 2017 Zimbabwe posts joined the UPU dot post group to benefit from security and interconnectivity which are strong foundations for digital services using the dot post to play for domain internet infrastructure. So in short, why dot post? Searching for the postal services on the internet became easier and it's a bridge which created, it's a bridge between the traditional physical mail services and new electronic ones. The domain also facilitated the entry for developing countries into the realm of electronic postal services. The new services can also be offered in a secure environment across the borders. The zoom post brand will also be strengthened and modernized and made instantly recognizable on the web. How dot post secure internet is imposed online presence in digital services. The zoom post is a trusted domain that provides high security for our national platform. The Zimbabwe mall which was 118 e-sellers as well as 499 projects which include postal projects and independent projects. The Zimbabwe mall provides 100% security to bias information which includes a debit card, personal information with globalization across border opportunities in areas such as e-commerce and other developing and others are developing. So the use of authentication security, e-payments and more important. eShops is established under the UBU dot post internet infrastructure accessible by 192 countries. The dot post domain is a secure environment which reduces e-shopping risk and they help deliver a stable and secure channel. Thank you. Thank you very much. I just wanted to remind colleagues that there are questions in the Q&A box that you can answer either by typing them in or you can answer them live if you wish now. And there's some questions in the chat. Would you like me to read them out? Okay let me go back to the questions. I'm not seeing any questions which are IT related. There's a question so let me make sure to read out in the Q&A box, in the Q&A function. There are a couple of questions. E-business from Philip. E-business requires extensive trading on staff and raising awareness of misconceptions about e-business. How has ZIMPOS to made sure that these challenges are being dealt with? And also how are post offices located in Zimbabwe? Approximately what is the necessity in post offices? And finally what are the internet or connectivity status in Zimbabwe? I think you can answer it either verbally here or you can type it in. And in the chat there's also a question that is being asked about how are you dealing with customs, situ challenges, sorry charges on cross-border e-commerce. Is it patine? I'm not sure if that's correct in the word, but is it patine along with the order of packet are assessed and duty fixed on arrival to ZIMPOS? I think that may be some French translation challenges there, but there's also the other question related to cross-border has been asked before. How are you dealing with customs, duty charges on cross-border e-commerce? Is it paid along with the order or packets assessed and duty fixed on arrival to ZIMPOS? I think what you can do in order to keep the flow maybe you can type the answers in the chat or in the Q&A box and you can probably move on to the next presentation part or you can, if you feel free to answer them now if you like. Thank you. Thank you. So I think let me just go through the questions that I've seen here. On our 479 products of 138 sellers of Zimbabwe mall or ZIMPOS is itself a seller too. So ZIMPOS is an e-seller, it's actually also registered as an e-seller offering postal products. Then we also have a wide range of other products in terms of category. Where e-sellers can then sit as e-sellers as well. So ZIMPOS, yes indeed it's an e-seller selling postal products on this Zimbabwe mall. Then the second question is, attract your sellers to join the platform and sell their products with the constant problem of sellers asking us how is our traffic? Okay, this I think I've responded to it earlier on. Then from Philip, it's e-business requires extensive training on staff and raising awareness of misconceptions about e-business. I think on this one is ZIMPOS, so the question is how is this ZIMPOS to make sure that these challenges are being dealt with and also how our post office is located in Zimbabwe. So on this question, ZIMPOS has got a training facility which is constantly on the lookout for staff training on new trends within the market for the different products and services that we are currently offering. And also products and services that are in line with our digitalization drive because as a post, we are moving with the vision of being a smart post office by 2025. And when we made smart post offices that we have to ensure that most of our products and services that are currently sitting on the premises of physical presence also sits on the digital platform. So the constant training is actually done by our training section and we have got a dedicated within the marketing division e-commerce section which ensures that they constantly do staff updates and they also assist with training material to our training officers. So that's how we have been ensuring that our staff are constantly trained in the post office because a number of our products and services are actually being digitalized moving from the traditional to the digital platforms. And then in terms of our distribution, ZIMPOS has over 240 post offices which are located in almost every district, every province in Zimbabwe. We have what we call districts, we have provinces and urban areas. And we also have 180 community information centers, 35 containerized village information centers where we don't have a post office we have containerized infrastructure where which offers our products and services. We also have what we call post offices of counters, these are all post our business which is being undertaken by maybe a retailer within a certain community in order to reduce our post density. So you then find that even at a certain we can call them a growth point maybe down in the village, the post office might be situated situated in a district and down in the village there is a grocery store and that grocery owner is also offering a business on a service level agreement with the post office. So you then find that our network as far as accessing post our products is concerned it's very expensive because of those kinds of arrangement and we also operate what we call post office points and post office procedures where we sign in partnerships with different service providers to offer also post our products within our post offices and then from Chris there is well everyone is calling for postal services to tap into e-commerce and the online market. How is import considering itself as being a part of the border system by ensuring the postal system is not used as a conduit for the importation and movement of contraband and other illegal products. So I think on this one we have a list of prohibited products and services that are not allowed to pass through even the post offices and we use those regulations strictly within our post offices but we also have some of our operations people whom I can allow to just comment a bit particularly on this aspect in ensuring that illegal products do not pass through the borders. As I'm waiting for the operations person I think the question from Joseph Shabalala on how many postal outlets we have I think I've mentioned it earlier on we have over 200 we have about 240 postal outlets we have 79 post office points we have 17 post office kiosks and we also run community information centers and containerized village information centers so in terms of our distribution we are covering almost every district and province here in Zimbabwe. You know sometimes as a joke we say if we combine all bottle stores you can they can not even compete to the post office is just on the lighter side so allow me to for Ndana from our operation site to also come into the issue of illegal products passing through the postal system. Pardon me my voice is not all that good but I'll try to respond to that question. Like she has said we have the list of prohibited items on our website if you visit the Zimbabwe mall dot course the list of prohibited items are listed there and when items are being dispatched at our central sorting office there are some security checks that are done including scanning and including the usage of sniffing dogs to ensure that no prohibited items are allowed to pass through the postal network thank you. Okay, I think the last question from Marias it's good morning thank you for your in written presentation in general what is the comparative cost advantage of implementing this platform. So, for implementing this platform, I think particularly from my predecessors we have presented I think from why we chose dot post. We are saying is in post we did not invest much because we took advantage of existing platforms that are already secure by going to up you and using the dot post domain. All the investment was actually done by up you we are simply writing on the existing infrastructure and the infrastructure is to our advantage because it's a secure domain and with Shopify, who are currently the frontline platform that we are currently using. We also did not do much in terms of investment, because they've already a e-commerce platform which you can then customize like I mentioned that what we simply did was to customize the platform to suit our market. And in terms of investment, be it servers, we there was no much investment from us. And in terms of cost, I think the choice of having the dot post domain and also Shopify is the platform proved to be very cost effective for us because we and we are also not investing in new technology as far as upgrading and updating the system is concerned. It's being done by the service provider. Thank you. I think from the question and answers, I've exhausted, unless there are some. So I think if you go ahead with responding in the Q&A box and typing it, you can probably proceed with your presentation because I know time is against us a bit. So I know there's a demonstration to be done. So maybe you can go ahead with a demonstration or something similar. Yes. Okay, thank you so much. I think our eco-message is just a demonstration of how Zimbabwe are more. There's time at the end. You can field more questions, obviously. Thank you. I'll just do a quick rundown of the Zimbabwe more features. To log in, you have to type the website URL www.zimbabwe.post. And if you are a new buyer on the mall, you need to have a buyer account. And if you want to be a seller, you need to have a seller account. The system won't allow you to complete the checkout process if you don't have an account. Okay, this is the log in page for a buyer, for a new buyer. You need to input your details if you are new and create your account. If you're an existing buyer, you just look in using your email credentials as shown on the slide. Then to log in as a seller, you just click where it is written, sell on Zimbabwe more. It will guide you on joining and creating a seller account. And sellers have their own accounts which they manage. We don't manage their accounts. This is the seller log in page and account creation image where a seller inputs his or her details. Then after registration, he or she uses his or her email address to log into his account. So this is the home page. The home page provides useful information that enables buyers and e-sellers to take necessary actions. Therefore, the following functions are available on this page. On the top left of the page, we have a currency converter. We have uploaded two currencies. We have the US dollar and we have our own local currency, the ZWL. So one can either buy using the local currency or using the US dollar. Then there is a search panel where customers can search for products using different categories. The client simply types in the product name you or she is looking for, for a quick search. Then we have the subscribe and set option. That one is for customers who want to subscribe to our newsletter. And my account option is the one that a buyer uses. It refers to the account of an e-buyer where one can log in to view his or her order history and account activity. Then the card on the top right is just an electronic basket where a customer can add these products during the buying process. And we also have advertising solutions. We offer online advertising space and these are some of our advertisers sitting on the platform. All present individuals can advertise on Zimbabwe Mall for a very little amount. And those who are willing to rent space, they just get in touch with us. There's an email icon that is on the far right, which is written, send message. If you just send your message there, who definitely get in touch with you and interact. The weekly deals for products, depending on the setting, deals can be allocated to a higher level promotion. In this case, products which were on promotion were textbooks. That's why they are the ones which are shown on the picture. And they are published to everyone. And one can actually make a purchase by simply clicking on the item on the weekly deals and it will lead you to the card and it will actually lead you to the checkout process, to the payment and checkout processes. Then we have product collections. These are product bundles which contain an assortment of several sets that usually belong to a common theme or have a common subject, like art and craft. If you click on that blue link where it's written, art and craft, it will lead you to everything that falls under the art and craft category. And we have the featured products. These are typically best selling or well viewed or brand new products. So they are meant for this featured products panel is meant to highlight products to our customers on the store front. This can be because we feel that we want to sell more of that particular item or a specific item we use that the featured product panel. Then we have promotional blocks. These are customizable blocks that are used to display content. This space can be used for advertising purposes. And from the picture that is on this slide, promotional blocks are used to display information on civil service travel. We have a clearing department within Zimbabwe, we also have a property management department and we have logistics and delivery. So these promotional blocks have been used to advertise those three. We have a full-time menu. It's more of a summary or a shortcut to some Zimbabwe more option. And in this case, the full-time menu is showing the basic information on Zimbabwe more. I think we may have gotten a disconnection there. I'm not seeing the screen. Sorry. Yes. I'm seeing a screen now. You can proceed I guess. I've been booted out, but I'm almost done. Then we have, this is our checkout page. This checkout page requires the customer's shipping information. You can use him, address it, country number before you continue with your shipment and method. The code includes the... Lost you again. Okay, we're seeing your screen, but we have no audio. If you're talking, there's no audio just in case you're not aware. Okay. Can you hear me now? Yes, we can. Yes. You can proceed. Can I proceed? Yes. Yes. Please proceed. Can you hear me? Yes, we do hear you. Please go ahead. We can hear you. You can proceed and we can see your screen. Please proceed. Please proceed. Can you hear us? Right now we're seeing how Zimbabwe more, but we're not hearing you. We've lost your screen. Okay. Go ahead. We're not seeing your screen now though. If you click the make payment button, the page will then... I'm calling. We're not seeing your screen. It's a request for your CVV card number as well as the name on the card for you to successfully make a payment. And this is a seller dashboard that we find on Zimbabwe more. A person can view the store sales and statistics and store earnings using the dashboard. And a seller can actually manage his way account using this analytics. And we have Shopify is our backend support. This is the homepage for Shopify. They provide analytics for orders, products, customers. There was a question someone asking for store traffic. This is where we get our traffic information. These are supported by Shopify. For orders, this is the page that we get from Shopify. We get the order list, which states the order number, the date, which was placed in the customer name and the amount that the customer pays as well as the fulfillment status. If you click on the order, it will give you the detailed information of the order so that you arrange for shipping if there's need for customer interaction. You do so the customer details will be provided. The same with the product listing. There's a list of the product that we offer on Zimbabwe more. Then online store speed and other key financial reports and even the store transactions and it is 100% accurate. This analytics and they also give us the number of sessions, because the returning customer rates, the average order values, the total orders as shown on this image. I've just attached a number of images. So everything is provided for and these limited manual processes. Everything is just for the best. Even the best selling products are also provided. Then Shopify provides us with a wide range of apps for applications for different purposes. We also need to cover the marketing options, conversions, store design, customer service, store management, merchandising, fulfillment, shipping and delivery. And in our case at the moment we are using three multi-vendor marketplace. This one is now for store management. You have the dynamic currency converter for the currency conversions on the platform and you also use the pop convert for banners and pop ups for advertisers on the platform. Thank you very much. Questions. So I think this is a time now for questions on. You can again use a Q&A box. So if you wish I'd be, you can raise your hands. As opposed to, do you have any more presentations at this point to me? No, I think these are the presentations that we, we head for today's session. Okay. All right, so I guess we could take any question additional questions that colleagues have right now. So if you have any questions, you're free to ask. Yes, go ahead. I have a question from Maria's on how we made this platform known to the general public or users. So what we did, like I initially mentioned that when we launched it initially it was in post more strictly for postal products. We then launched it as a national e-commerce platform and what we did this was actually launched by government by the minister of ICT postal and courier services where we report to as an organization. And government launched this platform and it was in all media platforms, the launch aspects. So we had a campaign from pre-launch to the launch date and post-launch we use in various mediums, be it traditional media to social media. And currently what we have been doing as far as marketing is concerned, we have been writing on the social media platforms to. I think we lost you again. To market the online shop. I don't know if there are other questions I had seen that one for how we ensured that the public knows and it's an ongoing effort actually because you find that a number of people still need to embrace online shopping. Thank you very much. Are there any further questions from colleagues, our attendees, participants? So as you can see, yes, go ahead. Okay, I think I was saying I don't know if there are any further questions but from our end I think we are done. All right, thank you very much. As you can see, Mesa has placed in the chat a link to tomorrow's session to register for the session tomorrow, 28th. This will get into some more technical details of today as you would have realized. This was not designed to be technical, designed to be more of a general achievements presentation tomorrow. There will be a technical detail. The thing that Mesa shared in the chat is available still to register for tomorrow session if you wish to attend. Same time, but you have to use this registration form, because it can't use the same link from today's session for tomorrow. You have to register with this form that is on that link for tomorrow session. If there are no further questions, I'm going to just share my screen to wrap up today's presentation if you don't mind. And what I will do is highlight the fact that this is a series that we're offering to the postal sector as well as to the general public. As you know today's session, we focused on Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe post, and as you would have heard, the dot post domain is the driving force behind the infrastructure of what they have done along with their back and provider Shopify. If you wish to learn more about that post, feel free to contact us, secretariat.info.post or you can learn about mobile.post at HTTPSregister.post. You can register domains based on your country, based on your postal operator name, or based on product names such as Zimbabwe mall.post, or even your country code. For example, ZW.post or TZ.post for Tanzania and so on. The approach that you take to register your domain name is to go to register.post to validate your organization and we will get in touch with you to give you more details about exactly how to register. If you can find all the information at HTTPSinfo.post or by contacting us at secretariat.info.post. Now, as has been hinted, this is the start of a series of presentations about our dot post group members. Today, you've heard about Zimbabwe mall.post and tomorrow, there'll be a deep dive as I said earlier, in terms of a technical deep dive as to exactly how they did what they what they did, and the challenges they would have encountered and a walk through maybe you can ask more technical questions there. In the following week, we have Senegal, our post Senegal, who will be delivering a presentation similarly in French at 11am on the 3rd of August and on 11am on the 4th of August, and on the 10th and 11th of August. 10am as well. This is all in Central European time. Tanzania will demonstrate their Stamps shop poster Stamps eShop. I'll link their HTTPS bit.po showcase gives you registration links for the public domain, the public sessions, and you can feel free to contact us. If you haven't received your emails already about the sessions that are the technical walkthroughs with everyone from the postal sector. So that's what I wanted to say. Thank you very much. Thank you for the video, but before that, I want to make sure that there are no further questions for Zimbabwe and Zimpost at this point in time. Are there any further questions that you have? It doesn't seem so at this point is I'm not seeing nothing in the, in the question answer box or nothing in that chat. So I would like to leave you with a short video about dot post that I invite you to take a look at and to join us tomorrow. If you are technically minded to understand more about the, what's happening with the dot post environment and how Zimbabwe used dot post and Shopify to deliver this, this fantastic solution. And I am very, very keen to hear about that myself. So thank you very much and that we leave this video with you as our, as you wrap up today's presentation. Welcome to dot post, a unique internet space managed by the Universal Postal Union, benefiting its members and the whole postal community, a safe space on the internet dedicated exclusively to postal services where security is maintained 24 hours a day. Each member of the dot post community can offer their postal services with confidence. A unique, innovative, integrated and boundless space in constant expansion. There are already over 50 members in the dot post group taking on the challenge to successfully facilitate cohesive digital strategies globally. Security standards adopted for dot post prevent redirection to unintended and fraudulent sites. Fishing attacks, malware, botnet and spam are monitored under dot post, complying with incident management procedures. Members can establish secure email solutions under dot post as well. Dot post is a digital gateway to new business possibilities. Posts can extend or transform the traditional services. By using dot post, they can improve their visibility, enhancing brand recognition on the internet. Dot post is a safe and reliable online market space for buyers and sellers. I'm sorry, I think I actually stopped that. In any event, I think time has run out and I will fix that technical issue shortly. So I just want to thank all of the presenters today from Zimpost. I really enjoyed today's presentation. I'm sure all of you who joined us today also enjoyed it. And I look forward to working closely with Zimpost and their team in the future. And I look forward to seeing many of you here tomorrow for the deep dive, technical deep dive in our session. I just thank all of the participants, attendees for your wonderful contributions in the chat, your excellent questions. And as I said, do come back tomorrow where we would work with you in this technical deep dive and our colleague from Zimpost would really walk you through the technical stages of how they did this. So thank you once again, do enjoy the rest of your day or your evening, your afternoon, wherever you are. And I really thank you one more time for joining us at our dot post member showcase webinar series. Thank you once again and do enjoy the rest of your day. Bye bye.