Supporting local companies to launch innovative and scalable commercial solutions to prevent malnutrition in Sahel

In Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, 21% to 42% of children under the age of 5 suffer from chronic malnutrition, stunting their growth and their potential. The Meriem project contributes to preventing malnutrition in young children and their mothers by bringing to market quality manufactured fortified food products. Together with partner NGO Gret, Hystra has been a co-lead of the project since its launch in 2018 in these 3 countries.

In 2020, we helped pilot sales of four new fortified products. 

The project also launched awareness-raising campaigns around the importance of nutrition, leveraging local influencers and telenovelas to broaden their reach.

In 2021, the Nafama spice – a fortified condiment specially formulated to meet the nutritional needs of women of childbearing age and lactating women – was launched in partnership with the Malian company Bara Musso. Nafama, composed of several local spices and containing vitamins and minerals, meets national and international quality standards. It is available on a large scale in Bamako via several complementary distribution networks.
Over 3 months of active launch, our dedicated salesforce of 40 agents carried out over 35,000 samplings for consumers in 40 different markets in Bamako, leading to the sale of 1.2 million sachets so far.