Beta Blockers Initiative
Ethiopian crackers with a potential to reduce malnutrition among children
Meet four young entrepreneurs from Addis Ababa, who want to impact the lives of millions of Children in Ethiopia through Nutritional Products: They developed a recipe for crackers that can fight malnutrition of children.
Naol and his friends are 5th-year Pharmacy students at Addis Ababa University and started their entrepreneurial journey by participating in the Hult Prize for Addis Ababa University. After winning The Hult and the NextGen East Africa World Food Programme Innovation Competition they started implementing their business idea. Their participation in WIDU enabled them to scale up the idea and to kickstart production of their nutritional crackers and other Supplement food products. To help children facing Malnutrition in Ethiopia, Beta Blokers Initiative uses local ingredients like wheat maize and other locally found product for their cookies.
WIDU’s Corona Business Grant allowed them to implement and start their working site and modify their business plan using the support from WIDU coaching: Now they bought the most important equipment like an oven and mixer. They also employed 2 people. "“It is the best culture of funding style that WIDU is following, it energizes the youngster and the coaching helps to invest it in the right investment. From my perspective as an entrepreneur it is the best way to help Entrepreneurs in Ethiopia and Africa.”, says Naol. Looking back on their entrepreneurial journey so far, he adds: “I learned an important lesson: Bearing most of the risks leads to enjoying most of the rewards.” bearing most of the risks leads to enjoying most of the rewards.
