Typical African parents will look forward to beholding their children achieve professions in medicine, engineering, law, or even in financial sector. However, only few parents enhance the entrepreneurial skills of their children by giving a much needed support for what they are curating.
Sulley Amin Abubakar, now the owner of the “biggest charcoal producing company in Ghana” and probably West Africa started off as a law student.
This Ghanaian entrepreneur was in his final year of law school when he opt out to start his business, Zaacoal, a company that produces quality and affordable environmentally friendly charcoal for households and industries.
On his commute to school, Abubakar saw many coconut vendors and wondered how they dispose of their waste. Usually, there are no proper channels to dispose of coconut husks, meanwhile, there are so many coconut vendors on every street corner. He took a trip to the beaches one day and saw how there were so many coconut husks littered all over the place.
His desire to venture into mass charcoal production was, however, ignited when he saw a kenkey street vendor make fire with coconut husk instead of the usual charcoal or firewood.
His curiosity was at its all-time peak about this time and he traveled to the northern parts of Ghana to learn more about charcoal production. With his newly acquired knowledge, Amin began experimenting with the idea of making charcoal from coconut waste in his home.
With his final year of school hanging in the balance, Abubakar used his tuition fees to finance his new venture. He tried making charcoal from the husk using a tomato tin and now he owns his own factory producing stainless environmentally friendly charcoal.
His family at this point did not know he had dropped out of school; they only found out after he had set up his factory. Since then, they have been his greatest support and he now works with almost twelve people at the factory.
