A SOUTH African local initiative called Oribi, a non-profit organisation offering skills development, training and support for entrepreneurs, is set to introduce one of the country’s first food incubation programmes in an effort to help solve the hunger crisis.
This month, they will be launching an open call for applications for this year’s cohort. It will start in Cape Town.
South Africa remains one of the most unequal countries in the world and faces endemic employment and chronic poverty. NPOs such as Oribi push entrepreneurs, organisations, public authorities and companies to impact society through tangible action.
Nthakoana Maema, programmes manager at Oribi, said their Food System programme aims to develop sustainable value chains, from farm-to-plate, by bridging informal and formal economies through social innovation.
“We work with social entrepreneurs whose business models are principled on the wellbeing of marginalised people, communities and our environment. Most importantly, finding new solutions in a complex system like food requires multi-level collaboration, experimentation and exploring possibilities with, within and from the unmet or under-served market,” Maema said.
The organisation partners with food system innovators to set up viable social business models and collective agencies with, within, and/or for marginalised communities.
Maema said Oribi’s objective was to strengthen the entrepreneurial mindset, economic inclusion and self-confidence of 50 food system innovators, especially youth and women entrepreneurs from rural and urban townships.
“Currently we’d like to support the launch and development of 30 innovative social enterprises enabling food security in SA through inclusive business models and to showcase, build trust and solidarity within the social entrepreneurship ecosystem to unlock collective growth.”
The most vulnerable populations living in rural and peri-urban areas faced the triple burden of poverty, unemployment and inequality.
About 25 percent of households had inadequate access to food and 27 percent of children under the age of five experienced a negative impact in growth and development. This clearly indicated South Africa’s food system is not easily accessible to all.
The South African Constitution states that: Everyone has the right to have access to sufficient food and at the national level South Africa is food secure.
Past Incubatee (2021 Cohort), Leon Qwabe, the owner of Order Kasi, a first of its kind township Uber-style service, said Oribi had taught them what a social enterprise is and what it entailed.
He said the programme had helped structure Order Kasi as a company and also set focused goals with timelines regarding their execution, and how to build partnerships as a start-up in a challenging space.
The meal delivery service exclusively offers food from restaurants based in the township and provides township restaurants access to a larger market through their platform, as they cater to customers who are also located outside the township areas, but crave a kasi meal.
The NPO believes building sustainable food value chains is where the next turn for social change will come from. They have designed their programmes to make entrepreneurship more diverse and inclusive to women and youth coming from or living in rural and urban townships. To date, more than 25 social entrepreneurs have already attended one of Oribi’s nine-month long food-related incubation programmes.
Dennis Molewa, mentor and food storyteller at Oribi, said as an entrepreneurial coach, he was especially looking forward to this year's food system programme due to its urgency.
“I believe that after the pandemic it is the ideal time to support local food entrepreneurs as they face an unsafe, unjust and unsustainable food system in South Africa."
The Covid-19 pandemic further deepened this crisis, with an estimated four million people at risk of hunger due to loss of livelihoods.
Maema said that now more than ever, corporates, private organisations, individuals and industry bodies need to work together towards overcoming one of South Africa’s often overlooked national crises, since relying on government efforts was simply not enough.
Food insecurity has serious health consequences for individuals, including an increased risk of chronic disease and poor mental health. The challenges faced by South Africa in terms of food security were not solely related to the production, but rather to the poor accessibility of healthy and nutritious food.
The persistence of hunger and malnutrition are complex and interrelated, spanning environmental, health, economic, socio-political and agro-food issues. However, there is a lack of engagement between these stakeholders including civil society, the private sector, farmers and government, and the barriers to entry are particularly tough for new entrants such as social enterprises.
In 2020, at the onset of the hard lockdown, Oribi and its partners launched “Bridging the Gaps”, an innovation challenge aimed at identifying and designing solutions that would re-route the food system towards feeding the most vulnerable communities. The upcoming Food System incubation programme is a continuation of this challenge.
BUSINESS REPORT