AfricaPress-Tanzania: BUSINESS Membership Organisations (BMOs) in Arusha are adopting Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software technologies to improve service delivery amidst the Covid-19 pandemic.
This follows two-day training by the East African Business Council (EABC) in partnership with German International Cooperation (GIZ), Business Scouts for Development and the Federation of German Industries (BDI) on using a CRM software set to improve the capacity of BMOs in processing data and communicating effectively with members of the business community.
Speaking during the opening of a training session, EABC boss, Dr Peter Mathuki, urged regional companies to adopt digital business models to improve business resilience and continuity amidst the pandemic.
“Covid-19 has brought forth opportunities in e-commerce, which have significantly scaled down the cost of doing business by automating manual office operations and reducing human interaction, hence increasing productivity and efficiency”, he said.
Dr Mathuki also noted that the pandemic demanded BMOs to be more proactive in giving feedback and analysing data from members to inform policy advocacy initiatives such as the elimination of Covid-19 related non-tariff carriers, among other things.
For his part, Executive Director of Zanzibar National Chamber of Commerce (ZNCC) Hamad Hamad stressed the importance of businesses to adopt digital tools to improve efficiency and maximise returns.
“EAC Partner States also need to adopt e-government solutions to give value to citizens,” he explained.
This happens as the African Development Bank (AfDB) projects that the region is set to recover to 3.7 per cent in the baseline scenario and 2.8 per cent in the worst-case scenario, under the assumption that Covid-19 would be contained in the short-to-medium term AfDB East Africa Economic Outlook, 2020.
The pandemic has disrupted the global supply chain impacting trade in goods and services in EAC.
EABC is the regional apex body of private sector associations and corporates in the East Africa facilitate an EAC integration process through trade and investment.
To achieve this EABC works with the public sector, EAC institutions, the academia and the business community to unlock the economic potential through increased physical access to markets, enhanced trade environment and improved business competitiveness.
