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Production Line French Fries (and Crisps).
Proposal Small business: 10-03-2006
Motivation.
I first visited Ethiopia in 2004 and I worked there for four months as a volunteer with CHAD-ET, an official and licensed Ethiopian NGO. CHAD-ET’s beneficiaries are abused and vulnerable children living in appalling conditions in Addis Ababa and the rest of (?) the country or countryside?. Amongst many other things, CHAD-ET provides girls now working in the sex industry< with condoms, medical care, AIDS/HIV awareness and general health counselling. Furthermore, CHAD-ET has initiated training facilities to teach the girls new skills that will enable them to start a small business and leave the sex industry.
Following my first visit, I searched for a way forward and new skills for these young people. I have been an entrepreneur myself. I was a director of a private school in fine arts for eighteen years and know from experience what it takes to transform an idea into a successful enterprise. After living in Addis, I could not get the idea of producing French Fries (and/or crisps) out of my mind. Despite the inferior quality of these products there is currently a great demand for them among tourists as well as Ethiopians.
Business
Ethiopia is experiencing an innovative trend in the tourist industry and in the area of health and hygiene standards related to employment, living conditions and the environment. Capitalising on these initiatives, Foundation Obelisk Ethiopia has developed a project in which we use our Dutch experience with French Fries to promote independence for the beneficiaries. CHAD-ET management is in agreement with this proposal entitled The Pilot Kitchen. Subsidies provided by The Wings of Support, enable the Pilot to carry out market analyses, to make the most of every opportunity and to get to grips with running costs etc. The Pilot Kitchen will be run in cooperation with CHAD-ET and Foundation Obelisk Ethiopia and will be carefully monitored.
We will train beneficiaries to produce economically and, more importantly, hygienically. The training will also include selling techniques and will address issues concerning consumer satisfaction.
The Production Line
The Production Line proposal is a follow up to the Pilot Kitchen and it will be a three part income-generating project in cooperation with CHAD-ET, The Obelisk Ethiopia Foundation, Genesis Farm and Hope Enterprise.
French Fries?
Top hotels and supermarkets selling luxury goods in Ethiopia are at this moment in need of high quality products for tourists and the richer Ethiopians. Expensive products are currently imported from Europe or America. We want to meet this demand by being the first professional producers of French Fries in Addis by marrying the Dutch experience to Ethiopian circumstances.
This production line will be designed and based on information we have obtained from the Dutch companies Aviko and Mac Cain. However we are going to start with a small-scale production line, in accordance with the Global Hygienic Standards. The Ethiopian Government intends to implement these standards in the future in anticipation of the growth in the tourist industry.
We want to use human labour in the production process to help as many girls as possible earn money within the local community.
Ethiopian manufacturers.
We will obtain all our furniture and materials, with the exception of professional French fries cutters, from local manufacturers. In this way the Ethiopian people will benefit from our investments.
How many girls will benefit from this small “factory”?
The majority of young adults are prostitutes or abused children with little education, homeless and/or without family. The sex industry in Mercato (Addis Ababa) is abusing young girls, who come from the country in search of a job in Addis. Most of these girls, aged between thirteen and twenty years, have had no primary education because there are no schools in small villages. CHAD-ET is helping them to develop new skills.
We want to employ 24 young adults who will earn a living in this enterprise.
1 Buying: Oils, potatoes, package materials etc.
8 Production: Pealing, cleaning, cutting, sorting, drying, cooking and frying potatoes
3 Packaging: Weighing, sealing and administrating.
2 Sales: Hotels and Supermarkets
2 Administration: Bookkeeping, calculating, salaries, insurances, monitoring.
1 PR and advertising works, print and distribution
1 Transport: (Driver will have get a driver’s license.)
2 Sales: small mobile units producing French Fries in the streets of Addis.
4 Sales: We want to open up a few small “snack bars”
Where will this “factory” be located?
We will start in or near Mercato so that our beneficiaries can walk to work.
This is a preliminary sketch of the building in order to get a picture of our requirements. As soon as we have raised enough money, an official architect / engineer in Ethiopia will make the final design.
Investments for the Production line building.
1 Rental: If the production line can be set up in an <existing building, renovation/conversion will be necessary to ensure adequate drainage and a hot water supply ***.
2 Construction:
A new building with approved hygienic standards and properly installed drainage would be preferable. As CHAD-ET will be the owner, the building will be safeguarded against external claims.
Investments for the Production line equipment:
Cooperation:
We are seeking cooperation with Hope Enterprise, a school for the poorest children
In this way we will support Hope Enterprise and build on a good relationship for the future.
We are seeking cooperation with Genesis Farm in Debre Zait to provide the potatoes. This is a Dutch organisation that runs a dairy and a chicken farm, employing and training 278 Ethiopians.
Fundraising and PR:
* We intend to ask for the donation of solar boilers from Nuon, < Essent or another energy supplier in the Netherlands.
** Malta has developed an advanced system for recycling and selling the cleaned cooking oils. We plan to contact the Maltese government and its University to cooperate with us and/or teach us how to recycle cooking oil that we will be using.
We are in contact with the Foundation of Relatives of Ambassadors in Addis, who are enthusiastic about our initiatives. They are willing to help us by promoting our project and including our work in their annual events.
To attract attention to our projects, we are in the process of making a promotion DVD about CHAD-ET and their drama group which we will use in presentations in schools and parties.
We will make flyers and ask local radio stations to give our projects air-time.
Time schedule :
There are two options to consider.
A We can start by renting an existing building which will have to be refurbished in order to get the building up to an approved standard. However, there is a risk that the landlord will end the lease as soon as the building is refurbished. This is not against the law (CHAD-ET has had experience with this in the past) and could lead to the loss of our investments.
B A new building. We have to take into consideration that in Ethiopia, the funding of every new building project must be legally approved before the required permits are issued. Once the funding has been agreed, the following steps are necessary:Finding a suitable site and obtaining planning permission.2. Obtaining building permission (I think this falls under planning permission)
3. Obtaining agreement from the local authorities
4. Applying for a licence to start a commercial business.
5. When all the permits have been gained and a plot of land has been allocated, it takes some months for the inspection of the soil on the building site to be completed. It is then possible to apply for the second permit from the Addis Ababa Building Administration.
Building schedule: Building will take approximately six months.
Aim: We want to be able to pay all our employees/trainees a fair wage for the job. In the future we can use our experience to build a production line in the countryside.
Prognoses:
Year 2: production improvement, building teamwork and loyalty amongst personnel, earning the goodwill and confidence of our customers.
Year 3 Profits will be used for new investments and expansion by installing snack bars and/or mobile selling points.
Saving and credits, We will be cooperating with a project CHAD-ET implements.
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