LDS has extensive experience in designing and implementing innovative programmes and growing entrepreneurs at every stage of their development – to ensure clients can measurably assist community members in their area of responsibility.

Our interventions aim to ensure sustainable shifts in local job creation and livelihoods whilst supporting entrepreneurs to integrate into accessible value chains.

In conjunction with key stakeholders across public and private sectors, we identify opportunities to further the next phase of Enterprise Development. As drivers of job creation and innovation, small businesses are effective avenues for lifting communities out of poverty. However, our experience over the last five years has shown that access to finance, human capital, markets, and infrastructure are persistent challenges.

To effectively address these challenges, we have adopted an approach that combines practical skills training, expert mentorship, e-learning, access to markets and access to finance.

Our programmes are primarily built around providing children with an opportunity to develop in the areas of numeracy and literacy through creative play and activities that will improve their health and well-being. We do this by ensuring that children have access to adequate facilities, trained educators, curriculum development, equipment provision and by assisting  Early Childhood Development centres  to become sustainable and fostering the independence of schools.

We have experience in successfully initiating and supervising waste management programmes in rural communities focusing on using waste as a medium for unemployed people to generate an income and to sustain them financially. The intended impact is to create an entrepreneurial environment where participants become ambassadors within the bigger municipal waste stream.  The programme also seeks to address the genuine problems associated with waste and recycling, which pose various health, safety and social threats to rural communities.

LDS has been involved in the area of social welfare and development throughout its stages of growth. Some of the aspects that have had measurable impact include health promotion, skills development, and community safety.

LDS take a dynamic approach to partnering with local authorities in and around the communities it is involved with to identify areas of need and provide support in line with Integrated Development Plans (IDP’s) and/or relevant developmental strategies. We also partner with other stakeholders including non-governmental organisations and relevant organisations that are participating and active in socio-economic development.

LDS also recognises the importance of partnership with all spheres of government in order to ensure smooth and efficient delivery of solutions.

Our innovative programmes initiate the provision of alternative skills which are aimed at promoting entrepreneurship and improving the opportunity for employment.

Through partnerships with established higher learning institutions and industry experts we have designed a standard delivery model for skills development in remote areas. This model considers:

• The need for a continuous, anchored programme that is running all the time and that has some locally-based staff who benefit from skills transfer.
• The need for a local person to lead implementation whom is sufficiently skilled in facilitation and administration and is fluent in the local language.
• Ensuring long-term sustainability of the initiative.
• Ensuring that the programme contributes to local jobs.

Our programmes seek to address social cohesion through enabling young people to break out of a cycle of poverty and inequality through education, sport development and community outreach. Primary to our objectives is to provide aspirational opportunities to talented and determined young people from disadvantaged communities and advocating real ownership of local resources and active citizenship.

We are committed to support initiatives in rural communities to help people and organisations generate an income through agriculture and food security programmes. We seek to promote locally sustainable solutions that meet the needs of Early Childhood Development centres, educational facilities and small-scale producers, particularly women.