Ethiopia's food entrepreneurs need investment architecture to scale up
via The Reporter Ethiopia4 min read
A nutrition scientist in Ethiopia, Alem Greiling, founded Nutridense, a company producing oat-based cereals and infant foods from local oats, sourcing from 400 smallholder farmers and distributing through over 100 women-owned micro-enterprises. Despite strong demand, local raw materials, and nutritional relevance, Nutridense faces challenges in scaling due to a lack of processing equipment and investment support. PIN Ethiopia's Nutrition Capital assessment, conducted over six weeks in March and April 2026, engaged 35 stakeholders and revealed that Ethiopia's nutrition challenge is an investment architecture issue, not just a food production problem. Promising food enterprises lack the finance, data, business readiness, equipment, working capital, and buyer relationships needed for growth. Many small food businesses are underprepared for formal investment processes, with weak records and governance. PIN Ethiopia introduced the concept of Nutrition Capital to bridge this gap, advocating for not just funding but also the conditions that enable investment to reach essential foods, such as cold storage, processing equipment, and digital payment records for farmers. With a policy window linking agriculture, nutrition, climate resilience, and agri-finance, PIN Ethiopia aims to build this architecture by connecting food businesses, farmers, banks, investors, government, and development partners.
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Rawuda Ali, head coach of the Ethiopian U-17 Women’s National Team, expressed disappointment over her team's inability to participate in the 2026 CECAFA U-17 Women’s Championship in Tanzania. The tournament, scheduled from June 13 to 23, will feature eight countries. The Ethiopian Football Federation decided against participation due to financial constraints, with Secretary General Bahiru Tilahun reportedly stating the tournament would not add value to the national team. Ali, a former Ethiopian women’s midfielder, believes the competition would have provided crucial international exposure for her squad, which is preparing for the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup qualifiers. She emphasized the potential of her players and the importance of such tournaments for their development and progression to the U-20 and senior national teams. Ethiopia is set to face Zambia in the final qualifying round for the World Cup. Participating countries in the CECAFA competition include Tanzania, Uganda, Djibouti, South Sudan, Somalia, Zanzibar, Kenya, and Sudan.
Ethiopian theatre, once a vibrant tradition in Addis Ababa, is currently experiencing a difficult period marked by declining attendance, increasing production costs, and the rise of digital entertainment. Historic venues like the Ethiopian National Theatre and Hager Fikir Theatre now host performances only once a week, with many shows playing to largely empty halls. For example, a recent performance of Shemgay at the Ethiopian National Theatre saw only about 50 attendees in a hall designed for nearly 1,200 people. Theatre professionals attribute this decline to several factors. Actor Getenet Teka, head of the evaluation desk at the Ethiopian National Theatre, notes that urban development has shifted populations away from city centers, and media promotion for theatre has decreased due to high advertising costs. Financial strains are significant, with ticket prices at government-run theatres rising to nearly 200 birr and single productions costing over 500,000 birr to stage. This makes attendance less accessible for theatregoers like Tefera Worku, who finds ticket prices and distance deterrents. Audiences like Efrata Tsegaye also express a desire for more innovative content, finding current productions repetitive compared to the diverse options offered by digital entertainment. Director Dagmawi Amelework points to weak audience engagement, institutional bureaucracy, and slow adaptation to contemporary practices as persistent challenges. He suggests stronger government support,
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