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Lumbidzani Dima, Chronicle Reporter
FOUR innovative girls from Eveline High School in Bulawayo are aiming big with their newly formed  energy bar company that has since received a grant and won awards in Zimbabwe and internationally.

During this year’s Zimbabwe International Trade Fair (ZITF) in April, the girls, who belong to a generation of problem solvers, managed to showcase their products at the Youth, Sport, Arts and Recreation Ministry stand and they attracted attention from various stakeholders.

Last week they were among 10 schools from around the world, including those from the United Kingdom and Japan, which were shortlisted for the World Best School Prize.

The girls’ energy bar or nutribar, is a line of nutritionally formulated foods containing cereals and micronutrients to supply quick food energy.

The Upper Six girls hope to continue running their company, Mystery Munch even after they leave school.

Vanessa Chitura (18) who is the Chief Executive officer, Nyasha Muganiwa (17) the Chief Operations Officer, Nadia Sadiki (19) the Chief Marketing Officer and Kholisani Ndlovu (18) the Chief Financial Officer said they are committed to the growth of their company.

The four entrepreneurs do the whole manufacturing process at the school’s food laboratory.

Miss Sadiki said the initiative was born early last year as a result of Junior Achievement Zimbabwe competition that ran under the theme “Innovation with grit”.

Their project came first.

The learners investigated a nutrition challenge, carried out an investigation in the form of market research and competitor analysis and developed an organic energy to meet the needs of their peers.

After the competition, they realised that the idea was too good to let go and that’s how the journey began.

“We were competing with other schools in Zimbabwe just to win after being encouraged by our teacher Mr Jobert Ngwenya.

We came out first with our idea of a nutribar (energy bar) which we branded Mystery Munch.

This was something different, something unique and a mystery,” she said.

Miss Sadiki said they came up with a nutribar idea after observing the vegan community and discovering a gap in the market for healthy and unprocessed foods.

To cover that gap, they did proper market research and came up with the healthy bar.

After competing with other schools in Zimbabwe, they qualified for another competition held in Mauritius where they went up against other schools from Africa and came out on position four out of nine.

They were also awarded an international award last year after entering the Ciena Solutions challenge, a global design challenge inviting students to design solutions to real problems and take action to build a better world.

“We were also awarded the Ciena Solutions challenge sustainability award and got funding from Hivos in partnership with Unicef Zimbabwe which we are so grateful for,” said Miss Sadiki.

Having done the nutritional testing of the nutribar, she said they are now confident to scale up production and with enough resources they intend to reduce production costs to ensure the bar is affordable to most consumers.

The bar is selling for US$1 each and the girls want to reduce the price so that most youths, including those from poor families, can afford it.

Miss Sadiki, however, said their journey had its ups and downs, especially after they decided to continue with the company after the Junior Achievement Zimbabwe competition ended.

“The issue of finance and coming up with better recipes that are new and fresh were some of the challenges but we did not give up.

Our biggest lesson has been teamwork because we’ve learnt that working together and sticking together makes us strong.

We are planning to embark on mass production of the bar soon to meet local and international demand,” said Mis Sadiki.

She said as young entrepreneurs who are still new in the business world, they continue to learn as they work to grow their company.

Miss Sadiki said their company promotes healthy eating among teenagers in the city and beyond through various campaigns.

“With a grant from Hivos in partnership with Unicef Zimbabwe we managed to carry out healthy eating campaigns at Bulawayo Adventist High School, King George VI High School and at the Bulawayo Junior City Council,” she said.