By Abha Anindita
The shift of the youth from government jobs to finally taking the risk and considering entrepreneurial opportunities is taking a step in the right direction, and as a cherry on the top of the cake is an entire ecosystem developed to back the budding entrepreneurs in the state.
The state of Meghalaya has something called the PRIME, an acronym for Promotion and Incubation of Market Driven Enterprises that was inaugurated by Chief Minister Conrad Sangma in 2020.
The programme aims at providing financial and business sense to budding entrepreneurs whilst training them over a period of one year. The Chief Minister’s Startup and CSR Week saw the Cohort 2.0 graduating and the fresh batch of Cohort 3.0 joining in.
The Cohort 2.0 were in incubation and were rigorously trained for a period of one year. Then they graduated and were presented with cheques. The Cohort 3.0 were the ones who received an initial amount of funding, and will be undergoing the incubation process.
Lamti Hazel Pohti and Athen Samuel Kharkongor after filling up the form for PRIME got selected nd are now a part of Cohort 3.0.
“As students, we know creativity but are really looking forward to PRIME sharpening our entrepreneurial skills,” Lamti said.
Similarly, Jessica A Sangma is the founder of Sophia’s Taste. She set up her business during the pandemic in a bid to reduce wastage of fruits. She started making several products and has slowly grown over time. Jessica makes her products from local ingredients and all of them have no added artificial preservatives.
“My products are all natural and some of them have medicinal properties. That is my unique selling point. I aimed at reducing the waste of food products during the pandemic, she said,”
“I came to know about PRIME through social media, and I was selected after a rigorous session and I am really looking forward to learning more about branding and promoting from the masters in here,” she said, excited.
While people who already have been through the one-year training session, they have nothing but good things to say about the one-year incubation.
Sister Avino Mao, the founder of NURSD, a start-up to facilitate healthcare in the comfort of one’s home said, “The idea of NURSD first emerged during the second wave of the pandemic. Elderly patients and patients with existing comorbidities had a fear of going to the hospitals to avoid contracting Covid-19. This is when we realised, what if we could bring hospital level nursing care to these patients?”
The first of its kind concept did face some initial struggles, however, it has slowly spread its wings across the city. “We aim to bring hospital level nursing care at the convenience of the patient’s home. Our services include elderly care, palliative care, critical care, post- op care, maternity and neo- natal care.” she added.
Commenting on how PRIME has helped them in their journey, she said, “Prime incubation programme for start-ups has really helped our organisation by giving us the initial seed money to kick start our journey. During the course of the incubation programme, we benefited by gaining initial contacts with relevant people through PRIME and most importantly the provision to utilise PRIME hub space for holding workshops and training programmes is beneficial for startups. We at NURSD are thankful to PRIME for all their support.”
Similarly, Bibhudatta Sahu and Sweet Syiemiong are the co-founders of HQ Inspired. When asked for the acronym of HQ, Sahu shrugged and said, “Everybody knows about IQ, SQ but tend to forget the most important aspect of one’s living, the Health Quotient.”
“In order to bring back healthy eating into the scenario, we are bringing back healthy food but not in the same boring way. Our motto is Your Health is our happiness,” he added.
The team is trying to inculcate the consumption of millets which used to be a staple food of the state before rice took over. But the twist is that they are trying to make it fun, tasty and healthy. Another concept that was loved by the prime team was that they are trying to develop millet-based milk which is richer in nutrients than the dairy milk and also is environment friendly.