Yonas Alemu, founder of the food company Lovegrass Ethiopia, has navigated a remarkable path – from growing up in rural Ethiopia, to working as an investment banker in London, and ultimately returning to his homeland to start a business.
Yonas Alemu, a visionary Ethiopian entrepreneur, has made headlines by exporting teff pasta to Italy, a country known for its rich pasta tradition. His journey from rural Ethiopia to global finance and back to his homeland is a testament to determination, innovation, and a deep connection to his roots.
In a recent interview, Yonas reflected on his upbringing in a farming community in Ethiopia, where some of his earliest memories involve waking up before dawn to help in the teff fields. Teff, a tiny grass seed native to Ethiopia, is among the world’s oldest cultivated crops, domesticated between 6,000 and 4,000 BC. For millennia, Ethiopians have used teff flour to make injera, a flat, spongy sourdough bread that is a staple in their diet. Celebrated as a superfood, teff is gluten-free and rich in nutrients such as iron, magnesium, manganese, calcium, zinc, and vitamins B and C. Even Ethiopian elite runner Haile Gebrselassie has credited teff as a factor in his athletic success.
In 2014, he came across teff in some health food stores in London but was perplexed after discovering the teff on shelves came not from its native Ethiopia, but from the US where it was commercially cultivated. Recalling his childhood and how hard the farmers toiled, Yonas decided to start a business selling Ethiopian food products in the global market.
Yonas began experimenting with teff-based products in his family’s kitchen and later refined these ideas in a lab. He decided to launch his company, Lovegrass, with teff-based pasta as the first product.
In 2016, Yonas left his position at Credit Suisse and relocated to Ethiopia to establish Lovegrass. Quitting his banking career wasn’t a difficult decision, as it was a move he had been contemplating for years. “I’ve been planning it and I’ve been wanting to do this for pretty much decades,” he said.