Jerry Mwenda

I am nominating myself for the Youth in Business Award because I have built a business around a simple belief: Africa has young people ready to work and businesses that need work done—we just need better ways to connect the two.
As the founder of Hokela Interactive Africa, I have built a technology-backed model that does exactly that. Through Agents on Demand, we train and deploy young people to perform real commercial work for businesses, from retail audits and market research to merchandising, activations, and field sales.
The impact goes beyond creating jobs. Young people gain practical experience, income, and a track record of work, while businesses gain the people and visibility they need to reach fragmented markets.
To date, Hokela has deployed more than 25,000 agents and mapped over 300,000 retail touchpoints across four countries.
For me, entrepreneurship is not only about building a successful company. It is about building something that creates opportunity for others. I am building Hokela around a simple cycle: **business growth creates work, and work creates opportunity.**
That is the impact I want my entrepreneurship to have—creating a business that can grow commercially while opening more doors for young people to participate meaningfully in Africa's economy.