Food and Nutrition Stars Align with Nutrition for Zero Hunger Initiative 

Jul 15, 2021

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In partnership with Herbalife Nutrition, USADF is supporting five grantees under the African Food and Nutrition Stars (FANS) program to increase access to healthy foods, initiate community development to reduce food insecurity, and facilitate nutritional education to help reduce malnutrition. In alignment with Herbalife Nutrition’s “Nutrition for Zero Hunger” initiative, the FANS Program will support each entrepreneur with $5,000 contributions, totaling $25,000. The African FANS—all former USADF grantees—will address the challenges of hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition for local populations via sustainable local solutions. The initiative aims to: 

  • support small scale farmers the African FANS source from in producing and supplying nutritious foods for local markets and local consumption. 

  • increase availability, affordability, and access to healthy foods for local communities to address food and nutrition insecurity. 

  • facilitate nutritional education and awareness amongst local communities to help reduce malnutrition. 

Here are the five (5) inaugural African FANS: 

Shepherd’s Mills, Ghana 
Priscilla Akoto-Bamfo​ 

Shepherd’s Rice Mills is a rice milling and packaging company located in the Savelugu-Nanton District. The company’s primary source of revenue is its commercial milling services to 60 rural women rice parboilers, who have been screened and trained in quality control processes of the business. The parboiled rice is sorted, graded, and packaged before being sold to urban consumers under the Zinaria Rice brand. With funding, Shepherd’s Mills will purchase a 10-ton truck which would reduce the costs of transport and allow it to engage new groups of women. The business will be adding 100 additional women to its database in 2021.  

 

Stawi Foods and Fruits Ltd., Kenya 
Eric Muthomi 

Stawi Foods is an agro-processing company specializing in the processing of banana extracts and grains into nutritious flour blends that are pre-cooked and fortified. Stawi aims to provide nutritious foods to the general public at an affordable price and contribute towards the development of Kenya’s smallholder farmers. With financial assistance, it hopes to recruit and train resellers, sensitize customers on the importance of good nutrition, and assist farmers with a new digitized supply chain allowing them to keep records easily and secure credit from microfinance institutions.  

 

MIS Poultry, South Africa 
Majubere Innocentia Maine 

MIS Poultry is commercial farm that was recognized at South Africa’s Department of Agriculture Female Farmer Awards. The enterprise raises and slaughters chickens and other livestock for local consumption. MIS Poultry looks to lower the local unemployment rate by hiring youth in the community and to ensure that nutritious food is available and affordable to all families. With funding, MIS Poultry will increase poultry and livestock production, construct a frozen shop for expanded cold storage to prevent food loss, provide hands-on training and educational experiences to local children, and hire several full-time employees.  

 

Colourful Giggles Nutrition, Nigeria 
Adepeju Jaiyeoba 

Colourful Giggles Nutrition was created to combat child malnutrition through cereal manufactured entirely from local grains, fruits, and vegetables. To date, it has served over 5,000 mothers and their babies while also currently stocking 200 women-owned stores with cereals at the retail distributorship level. With funding, it will purchase new processing machines to increase production, sourcing from mainly female local farmers. Colourful Giggles plans to train 500 mothers on how to use local and affordable foods to ensure their families are receiving proper nutrition. 

 

Nutrie Foods, Zimbabwe 
Nobukhosi Ndlovu 

Nutrie Foods was founded to economically empower rural women farmers without access to markets through value addition of agricultural produce. The enterprise has created employment for 48 people in its processing plant and has increased its number of rural women farmers suppliers from 20 to 7000. Funding will allow Nutrie Foods to procure a van to transport employees to work, improving productivity and contributing to food security as most of their products are basic commodities.