Marie Herman - Participant 2017-2018
This year allowed me to move from ideas to reality.
Role
Marie Herman helped Casibeans to develop a project aimed at increasing supply chain traceability and achieving more direct trading, as an alternative to standard trading practices.
Responsibilities
The tasks outlined in the project description were numerous and the targets to be achieved very challenging. After three months, Marie had visited all the main potential bean suppliers in Tanzania and performed an analysis based on a framework that she developed herself. She later conducted the same exercise in Ethiopia. This resulted in a report that gave the company’s Board of Directors a better understanding of the possible options.
How she benefited
This Prince Albert Fund year opened up a whole new world for her, during which she learned about trading, the importance of quality specifications, dealing with business as a woman in a male-dominated business landscape. In addition, she discovered how to move on quickly when an initial idea did not work out instead of accumulating frustrations and the importance of building up genuine relations to facilitate reaching the targets.
“It was extremely satisfying to see the 48 tons of Ethiopian beans – an operation I set up from scratch – in our warehouse in Antwerp!”
The company – Casibeans
A family company since 1935, Casibeans is a trusted supplier of safe, sustainable and nutritious specialty crops and related products. Based in the port of Antwerp, the company mainly supplies dry pulses to the food industry such as beans, lentils, peas and chickpeas.
“At one stage, Marie moved to Ethiopia, where at her own initiative, she conducted a comparative study of the agricultural sector in both Tanzania and Ethiopia, and this from different aspects – farmer organizations, quality levels, pesticides, and so on. Impressive and very useful to us!”