Construction officially began Monday on the SME Village at MozParks’ Topuito Industrial Park in Mozambique’s Nampula Province, launching a 12-month project designed to give small and medium-sized enterprises dedicated infrastructure to expand operations, access markets and plug into larger industrial supply chains.
The project is financed by the Government of Mozambique and the World Bank through CONECTA Negócios — Projecto de Ligações Económicas para Diversificação, known as PLED.
The SME Village is being developed within Topuito Industrial Park, which is operated by MozParks, and represents a targeted bet on small business as an engine of regional industrialisation in Northern Mozambique.
ADIN, the Agência de Desenvolvimento Integrado do Norte, is playing a central coordinating role, representing the government’s regional development interests and supporting the implementation of PLED activities led by the Ministry of Finance across Cabo Delgado, Niassa and Nampula provinces, three of the country’s northernmost and historically underdeveloped regions.
Once complete, the SME Village will include workshops for light manufacturing, warehouses and cold storage facilities, office and training spaces, a food court for local catering suppliers and accommodation units.
This is a combination designed to cover the full range of operational needs for small businesses moving from informal or small-scale production into more structured commercial activity.
Onório Manuel, CEO of MozParks, framed the project as a direct response to market access, one of the most persistent barriers facing African SMEs.
“Small and medium-sized enterprises are one of the main drivers of economic growth and job creation,” Manuel said. “But for SMEs to grow, they need to be connected to real market opportunities. The SME Village will help create that connection by bringing local businesses closer to larger companies and giving them better conditions to integrate into their supply chains.”
Speaking at the groundbreaking ceremony, Tito Remigio Alecho, Director of the Larde District Education Service, pointed to the project’s expected ripple effects on local employment and youth opportunity.
“We believe the SME Village will become an important space for the growth and strengthening of small and medium-sized businesses, providing better conditions for production, commercialisation and service delivery,” Alecho said. “Above all, we expect this investment to contribute significantly to local job creation, particularly for young people, and to greater economic inclusion.”
Local participation starts during construction, with the Topuito community involved in building the Village to foster local support and create jobs before it opens.
The project aligns with broader efforts in Mozambique and the region, where World Bank-backed programs focus on SME infrastructure to connect small, often informal businesses to formal supply chains that have historically favored larger, better-capitalized companies, including foreign investors in the resource-rich northern part of the country.
Once the 12-month construction period concludes, the SME Village will add a dedicated SME and logistics hub to Topuito Industrial Park, creating new space for Mozambican businesses to establish themselves, scale their operations and capture opportunities generated by the wave of industrial investment moving into the region.
