In a heart-warming story Emma Graham-Harrison reported from Kabul on a business that has grown rapidly and has managed to cross all ethnic, language, and ideological differences. Highlights include:

• Ahmad Faizy decided to capitalize on his hometown’s reputation for making the best ice-cream in Afghanistan. He began with a $500,000 investment and now estimates that his company is worth $15 million.
• The ice -cream goes to the most dangerous parts of Afghanistan in expensive refrigerated trucks. Yet they are never attacked because “even the Taliban like ice-cream.”
• The ice-cream is sold from street vendors who announce their arrival with a loudspeaker that blares “My Heart Will Go On”
• Estimates suggest that 2/3rds of Afghans are below the age of 25 – an ideal market for a budding ice-cream business.
• Faizy produces 30 tonnes of ice-cream a day and each packaged item costs around 20 cents.
• The company is backed by a US government team that aims to develop small enterprise.
• The biggest problem the company faces is competition from Iranian ice-cream makers who have taken note of the opportunity and are undercutting price to gain market share.

It’s a beautiful story from a country that for the past century or so has had to deal with arguably the worst circumstances in the world. If you click here you can find out about future plans, barriers to doing business in Afghanistan, the different ice-cream flavours available, what happens in the winter, what they need to grow even more, and a review of their products with a surprising conclusion.

Source: The Guardian

Via: Marginal Revolution