#41: Using your passion to start a business in with Emily from Awali Shea Butter

This week Ziada and Mary Ann talk to Emily Waithira Founder of Awali Shea Butter, a business exporting natural organic shea butter harvested in Uganda to Kenya and beyond. She tells us about the challenges of starting up, the importance of having a Team alongside her and why we shouldn’t let fear of failure jeopardise our dreams.

Emily Waithira is the Founder and Managing Director of Awali Shea Butter a company supplying 100% original, pure, organic, raw, unrefined Shea butter from Northern Uganda which is popularly known as Nilotica Shea butter. “Awali” means original in Kiswahili language.
Emily has a background in Finance and Business Administration and holds an MBA in Strategic Management. Together with her sister the two registered Awali Shea Butter in Kenya in February 2016 and the business became fully operational in January 2017. They dedicated the interim period towards product research and setting up business structures and systems. Awali regional sales and distribution point is located in Nairobi, Kenya with its production unit in Kampala, Uganda close to where the Shea nuts are collected.
Awali Shea Butter is driven by its vision “To be a leading player in the natural care industry in East and Sub-Sahara Africa”. Awali‘s unique selling point is its promise of quality and high standards in the Shea industry which will ultimately contribute to sustainability in the Shea value chain. We have set up the right structures to ensure we can meet this. We sell our Shea butter on both retail and wholesale basis.

Awali will achieve its vision by proving our customers with premium quality unrefined Shea butter that treats and cleanses your skin and hair at a fair price. We want the market to be aware and benefit from this amazing product that we and our families have proudly enjoyed.

Connect with and find out more about Emily and Awali She Butter

Facebook: Awali Shea Butter

Instagram: @awali_shea_butter

Contact Awali Shea Butter via quality@awalishea.com and  +254 721 138 953/ +254 718 008 214

#40: Demystifying Tantra: Creativity and Sexuality with Christina Lynch

In this show, Mary Ann talks to Christina Lynch about why she got interested in exploring sexuality in a new way, how it has helped heal the wounds of her past and why Tantra and ritual need not be mysterious or scary. Instead, she explains, they can support us in learning to connect to ourselves and one another more deeply.

Christina is a tantra facilitator, ritual guide and energy therapist. Her passions and experience are in the realms of sacred sexuality and soul-centred leadership. She holds space for deep listening and open communication, guiding people to reclaim their life force, their voices and their own innate wisdom. In 1:1 sessions she works intuitively with clients to release and transform trapped emotional blocks and trauma.

Connect with and find out more about Tanya and her work:

Facebook: Being Christina Lynch

Instagram: @beingchristinalynch

Twitter: @christinatlynch

Website: http://christina-lynch.com/

Details about the workshop in Bristol, UK that Christina mentions in the show: www.facebook.com/events/1985967451635021

#39: The Boundary Challenge

This week Ziada asks Mary Ann to tell her all about the work she has been doing around having clear boundaries and how it relates to change making work. We talk about our own experiences of wishing we had more clarity and saying YES when we wanted to say NO and Mary Ann shares more about what the Boundary Challenge, which runs in the Jijaze Community until the end of August.

#38: Talking straight about women’s issues in Uganda with Majo

This week on Change Making Women we talk to Majo (Marjorie Angella Athurra) of the Gejja Women’s Foundation in Mpigi in Central Uganda. We hear about her own story, her work with women in her own community and how she is working to end shame and secrecy around menstruation.

Majo’s story in her own words:

‘I was born to two school going teenagers on 16th August 1992. My father was 16 and my mother was 14. I was abandoned shortly after birth. That led me to grow without parents and that parental gap meant I lacked childhood love, guidance and care that every child enjoys as they are growing. That significantly affected my self-esteem and as a result, I hated myself since I was regarded a bastard, useless and a child without any future. At the age of 14, I started my mensuration periods and my guardian at that time suggested I get married since there were no finances to help take care of the basic safe, hygienic and healthy menstruation materials. That gave another picture that they actually wanted to send me early marriage not only to stop being a burden, but also with the hope that through me, they could get some income. However, I managed to continue with school but was staying with whoever offered to house me and finance my education until 2011, when I got a government sponsorship to join Kyambogo University and pursue a diploma in English and Literature. Later in 2014, I joined the Social Innovation Academy where I was mentored and developed Gejja women foundation, an organisation through which I am fulfilling my passion of helping the young girls and women who are in the rural areas and marginalised. This initiative also empowers the widows who have no ability to sustain their livelihoods or educate their children.‘

Connect with Majo and find out more about her work:

Gejja Women Foundation Website: www.gejjawomenfoundation.org

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Gejjawomenfoundation/

Recent Comments