HOW APPRENTICE PROGRAMME SHAPED BONITUS’ FUTURE IN HOTEL INDUSTRY

A youngster Bonitus Barnaba Barungi

Bonitus Barungi speaking during an interview

By Staff Writer

Dar es Salaam. 

BONITUS Barungi (30) had dreams of becoming a teacher throughout his days as a primary and secondary school student in his Bukoba home town.

Having been brought up in a rural setting, teaching was the most decent job he had ever seen.

Facing financial constraints back home, he moved to Dar es Salaam where he was lucky to have been enrolled for a two-year diploma course at the National College of Tourism (NCT), thanks to an apprenticeship programme supported by the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

Launched in 2014, the programme – an initiative of the Tourism Confederation of Tanzania (TCT), the Hotels Association of Tanzania (HAT) in collaboration with NCT - sought to enhance skills and entrepreneurship for improved labour productivity and employment creation.

During the course of training, he was deployed for a field attachment at Southern Sun Hotel in Dar es Salaam where his star started to shine.

“While undertaking practical training at Southern Sun, the requirement was that during the first year, we were to go through all the departments from reception to kitchen and from servicing to housekeeping,” he explained, noting that that was how the dream of becoming a teacher started to die slowly. 

Bonitus Barungi prepared chiken for customers

By the second year of his diploma studies, he had developed the love for kitchen activities. “I did that because I came to realise that food is about health living and that every person requires healthy food. I decided to turn my future into preparing healthy and delicious food for everyone,” he told this paper in an interview.

His courteousness and empathy to learn new ideas once introduced by the kitchen brigade, finally paid him when the hotel hired him for a one-year contract.

That was not the end of it. A few months later, the Southern Sun Dar es Salaam management found an opportunity to take some off-shore staff for practical training in Cape Town and he was picked.

Whilst in South Africa, he met chefs from other countries and cultures, which helped him to learn more of other cuisines.

“The beginning was odious. I was the only Tanzanian in the group of eight people, picked from South Africa, Mozambique, Nigeria, Seychelles and Zambia. I was also the least experienced in chef activities out of them all but with time, we were on the same wavelength…I managed complete my Diploma Certification with a distinction after spending 11 months of practical training there,” he explained.

Back home, he is now thinking of establishing his own Chefs’ Academy where he will help other upcoming youngsters who are passionate about food.

“This will give me more room to utilise what I have gained from school and within operations in the industry,” he said.