Adoption of vineyards, reuse of water from the air and insect-based foods among the finalist ideas for Empowering Women in Agrifood

The ten women entrepreneurs will compete in the Portuguese final of the 4th edition of EWA on November 8th in Lisbon. 

The competition on the pitch day of November 8th includes ten ideas that seek to reuse agri-food waste and by-products, help 100,000 people in vulnerable situations to improve their eating habits, improve meal preparation in restaurants, create healthy snacks that are simple to prepare, adopt a vineyard and try the wine produced there, install and reuse water from the air, create smart small urban farms, launch insect-based food alternatives, develop a robot that will reduce the need for the use of antibiotics in agriculture, and create a indoor hydroponic system to grow food at home.

In detail, these are the ten women entrepreneurs from the 4th edition of Empowering Women in Agrifood (EWA) in Portugal:

Ana Fernandes – Agrenatus | To address the great challenge of the lack of connection between agro-food waste producers and the key-players able to transform them into innovative, high added value and sustainable products, Agrenatus aims to prevent agro-food waste or by-products to end up in landfills: establishing a bridge, offering the possibility of commercializing the agro-food residues and by-products.

Claúdia Ferreira – Coaching 100k for Health | Aims to transform the lives of 100,000 people in socially vulnerable situations, enabling them to achieve full and lasting health through a comprehensive health coaching program and food and culinary education. The goal is to change the reality of food poverty, helping people to make healthy choices within their financial limitations and acquire culinary skills to prepare nutritious and delicious meals.

Henriqueta Ramos – Flavorite | Digital platform for pre-ordering meals to optimize preparation at restaurants and avoid food waste. Flavorite will also perform intelligent suggestions for menu creations at restaurants based on the restaurant’s stocks available.

Marlene Machado – Snackisy | Developing a wealth of healthy and easy-to-prepare snacks. The natural ingredients make them protein-rich and fit for vegans. Environmental-wise, Snackisy has biodegradable packaging to ensure a lower climate impact while guaranteeing a tasty snack.

Carla Ramos – Real Vines | Adopt a vine, support the local economy – by hiring staff to work in the vineyards and endogenous products – and enjoy the unique experience of tasting your own wine without the burden of owning the vineyard.

Nabiha Ben Sedrine | To optimize water resources and energy resources simultaneously, the proposed solution will collect water from the air (humidity, evaporation and plant transpiration) without associated energy costs by absorbing moisture at night and collecting pure water during the day.

Sara Leitão | Small-sized Urban smart farms that connect its local community to farm together with our teams support. The goals is to make farming fun and simple, and also adapted to your needs, time and farming knowledge.

Sara Martins – Portugal Bugs | Intends to launch various insect-based food alternatives, such as protein bars, pasta, crackers, hamburgers, and other day-to-day consumer food products. Portugal Bugs will replace less sustainable food alternatives to slow down the consumption of natural resources while providing consumers with high-quality protein food.

Liliana Correia – Germirrad | Developing a simple autonomous robot for continuous hybrid disinfection. The static equipment of lower cost can disinfect, for example, footwear in clean rooms, but it is mostly tailored to agriculture and livestock – as it will decrease the need to use antibiotics while assuring a low death rate of animals.

Sarra Haribi | Creating an indoor hydroponics system that is practical to grow your own food from the comfort of your home but also aesthetically pleasing, including an online market offering all the necessary goods related to the system; seeds, nutrient solutions and spare parts.

Supported by the European Union, EIT Food invests in projects, organizations and individuals that share the goals of a healthy and sustainable food system and has provided support, guidance and training to more than 260 women entrepreneurs between 2020-2022, and awarded almost €400,000 in prizes during the final competitions.

In more than 25 networking events, startups, solopreneurs, companies, investors and the agri-food ecosystem connected, creating new partnerships and opportunities for stakeholders.

More than 40 agri-food startups grew in number of customers, employees or turnover, 20 new women-led companies were registered during and after the program, and more than €12,000,000 in investment was attracted by EWA entrepreneurs/startups.

The feedback and monitoring of entrepreneurs reveals satisfaction with the program (more than 8 out of 10) and the business growth achieved in these six months, proven by new agreements with investors, first customers and employees and confidence in communication with stakeholders.

October 26th 2023