ENTERPRISE54 – Looking back at the hours spent swapping stories on Facebook five years ago, 26-year-old Almaz Tegene had no idea that her new online friend, Selome Mekonnen, would end up being her business partner.

Almaz, Selome and Asratemariam Sileshi are three young women, who find themselves part of a new breed of Ethiopian entrepreneurs who are being supported through an Entrepreneurship Development Programme (EDP) launched by Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn in February 2013.

The EDP has since attracted the support of development partners such as Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (DFATD) which provided USD 5.8million to the programme in April 2014.

“Canada is proud to help create jobs by promoting the growth of small businesses in Ethiopia, especially businesses owned by women,” said Christian Paradis, Canadian Minister of International Development and La Francophonie at the time of the announcement of the partnership between Canada and UNDP on entrepreneurship.

Over four thousand Ethiopians have gone through an entrepreneurship training workshop since the Entrepreneurship Development Centre (EDC) was set up following the launch of the EDP in 2013.

Both Selome and Almaz have gone through the intensive entrepreneurship training workshop and subsequent Business Advisory Service (BAS) support provided by the EDC.

While exploring business ideas five months’ ago, the group of friends finally settled on Selome’s long time passion for including mushrooms into her every meal. The number of people requesting Selome to buy them some when she next goes shopping for mushroom ignited an idea of starting an in-door mushroom production business.

THE MUSHROOMS ARE GROWN ON A BED OF WOODEN CRATES IN THE BACKROOMS OF A CONDOMINIUM IN ADDIS ABABA

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