JU is pleased to announce that its staff member and students won the Green Innovation and Agritech Slam 2019 in various categories. The Green Innovation and Agri-Tech Slam (GIAS) is a nationwide agricultural business competition that aims to find innovative solutions to critical challenges of the agricultural sector.
Jimma University staff Dr Sirawdink Fikreyesus received the 2019 Green Innovation and Agri-Tech Slam, Legumes Value Chain Challenge Award for his innovative work as the developer of “Gabbisaa”: a baby food. Dr. Sirawdink’s business idea will hugely contribute to better nutrition among children from six months on as the product is optimized for nutritional and sensory properties. The baby food product is designed using local ingredients and hence, can encourage local growers. Local processing of “Gabbisaa” can also create jobs for the youth. Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) involved in processing of this product can also contribute to the economy.
Dr Sirawdink is an Assistant Professor of Food Science and Technology at the Department of Post-Harvest Management, Jimma University. The following professionals were also part of the team. Prof. Dr Oliver Hensel is a Professor of agricultural and biosystems engineering at the University of Kassel, Germany; he was a supervisor of Sirawdink’s PhD dissertation. Prof. Dr Tefera Belachew is a professor of Human Nutrition at Jimma University, Ethiopia; he was also Sirawdink’s local supervisor. Dr Barbara Sturm is the head of process and systems engineering in agriculture at the University of Kassel. Haile Tesfaye is a lecturer at Jimma University and joined the team as an MSc student.
JU students Jermia Bayisa Lulu (MSc Students in Computer Networking), Boaz Berhanu Tulu (staff and MSc student in Computer Engineering) together and Abdurhaman Shemsedin (MSc student in Computer Engineering) also won the competition and were awarded seed investment for startup company establishment.
Accordingly, Boaz and Jermia won the GIAS 2019 award for the Category “Agri-Entrepreneur with Digital Innovation or Business (Pre-Revenue) on Smart multiple crops disease detector, monitoring and prevention apps. Abdurhaman Shemsedin on the other hand won the GIAS 2019 for the Category “Agriculture value chain of wheat of Lionox #GIAS2019 GiZ .
JU is proud of its staff member and students for winning three of the five different categories.