Due to my interest in entrepreneurship and African development, I have for the last year become active in developing trade between Sweden, my home country, and Ethiopia, one of my countries of origin the other one being Eritrea. One of the driving reasons for this being that I believe that an increased export from Africa can contribute to a raised standard of living in the region.
For several years I've been playing with the idea of starting my own brand of clothes made in Ethiopia (see Wax & Gold). The company never got off the ground due to lack of commitment from myself, but also because I had trouble finding companies to work with and other obstacles I encountered along the way.
Despite this setback, I never lost the desire to contribute to the development of East Africa, so I continued looking for ways that I could work in this sector.
Last year I crossed paths with a professor looking for individuals with a background in Ethiopia to help him start an organization with a similar end. The project name would be DiasporaLink. Since then we've worked on a project with the aim of delivering a prototype for an IT-platform where the Ethiopian diaspora in Sweden could find information, finance and build competence in areas where they lacked it.
So far we've managed to build a network of stakeholders in Ethiopia, as well as engage a group of Ethiopians in Sweden interested in creating their own business. The next step is creating a business association of Swedish-Ethiopians which can co-ordinate work and communicate with the Ethiopian diaspora in Sweden.
For several years I've been playing with the idea of starting my own brand of clothes made in Ethiopia (see Wax & Gold). The company never got off the ground due to lack of commitment from myself, but also because I had trouble finding companies to work with and other obstacles I encountered along the way.
Despite this setback, I never lost the desire to contribute to the development of East Africa, so I continued looking for ways that I could work in this sector.
Last year I crossed paths with a professor looking for individuals with a background in Ethiopia to help him start an organization with a similar end. The project name would be DiasporaLink. Since then we've worked on a project with the aim of delivering a prototype for an IT-platform where the Ethiopian diaspora in Sweden could find information, finance and build competence in areas where they lacked it.
So far we've managed to build a network of stakeholders in Ethiopia, as well as engage a group of Ethiopians in Sweden interested in creating their own business. The next step is creating a business association of Swedish-Ethiopians which can co-ordinate work and communicate with the Ethiopian diaspora in Sweden.
