Jumia’s J-Force program creating jobs for young entrepreneurs

Juma Cheja, a Nairobi based business man is one of the sales agents who has benefited from Jumia’s J-Force program. Juma who has been in the program since October 2017 says he makes an average of Kes. 400,000 per month to supplement his income since he started the program.

Juma is among the more than 6000 agents who were recruited and trained under the J-Force program since its inception in 2013.

‘’The program has been very helpful in supplementing my income. It basically acts as my source of income. I source for potential customers who would like to purchase online , place an order on their behalf on the Jumia website and then earn my commission’’ Juma says.

J-Force is a sales consultancy program that allows individuals to earn commision by assisting customers place orders on Jumia. Anybody can sign up for the program online and they will receive free sales and digital training from the Jumia team. They can then go ahead and sell the over 700,000 products listed on Jumia to customers in their neighbourhoods. The sales agent will then earn a commission ranging from 3% to 10% and can be paid up to Kshs 1 million depending on number of sales made per month.

‘’ My highest commission was during last year’s Black Friday where I made Kes.590,000.  This has given me more motivation to work harder and even recruited people to help me out’’ Juma adds.  

Jumia hopes to bring the much needed self employment to young people across the country with this program.

“The J-Force program is of great significance to the country as it creates employment, helps us educate customers in how to shop online, and contributes a significant share of Jumia’s sales”, Clarice Odando, J-Force Manager said during the award ceremony.

A recent report by United Nations; Human Development Index (HDI) 2017 puts the unemployment rate in the country at 39.1% and initiatives like the J-Force aim is to reduce this rate.

The J-Force program currently exists in Nigeria, Egypt, Morocco and Ivory Coast, with close to 100,000 sales agents across Africa.  Jumia aims to recruit 20,000 agents in Kenya by the end of 2018.

Want to be a J-Force Agent? Click  here.