Elizabeth Oladepo is improving food safety and farmer livelihoods through 07 Foods.
Elizabeth Oladepo is part of a growing generation of Nigerian entrepreneurs trying to fix what breaks down between farms, processors, and consumers. Through 07 Foods, the company she founded and leads, she focuses on food safety, waste reduction, and smallholder livelihoods in a sector long shaped by informal practices and weak regulation.
Her entry into the space is personal. In 2019, her eight-month-old daughter falls ill after consuming contaminated flour. The incident exposes Oladepo to the scale of adulteration and poor processing standards embedded in Nigeria’s food value chain, problems that are widely known but rarely addressed at source. Rather than move on, she begins to study how food moves from farm to table, researching supply chains, processing methods, and quality controls. That inquiry becomes the foundation for 07 Foods.
The company begins with staple products like yam flour, unripe plantain flour, and kokoro, a traditional maize snack, items commonly consumed but often produced under inconsistent conditions. Oladepo prioritises additive-free processing and strict separation of raw materials to reduce contamination risks. The approach aligns with a growing urban consumer base increasingly concerned about traceability and food integrity, even as price pressures remain high.
Beyond food safety, Elizabeth Oladepo drives 07 Foods to experiment with waste reduction. Crop residue that would typically be discarded or burnt is repurposed into livestock feed, offering a small but deliberate intervention in an agricultural system where waste is often an afterthought. While modest in scale, the effort reflects a broader shift in how some Nigerian agribusinesses are beginning to think about environmental impact.
Working with smallholder farmers
Smallholder farmers, particularly in Oyo State, sit at the centre of 07 Foods’ supply chain. The company’s model depends on steady sourcing while offering farmers more predictable demand and, in some cases, additional income streams through by-product utilisation. These partnerships remain limited in number but reflect an attempt to formalise relationships in a sector where volatility is common and margins are thin.
Alongside its commercial operations, 07 Foods runs training programmes aimed at women and young people, focusing on food processing skills and small-scale entrepreneurship. The initiatives contribute to local capacity building, though their reach remains small relative to the scale of Nigeria’s agricultural workforce and youth unemployment challenge.
The company’s work aligns with elements of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, particularly those related to food security and responsible production. Oladepo’s efforts also attract attention within Nigeria’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. She received the Nigeria 25 Under 25 Award for Agriculture in 2020 and secured grants that support equipment purchases and incremental expansion. In 2025, she received a $1,500 award from Grey, recognising her contribution to safer and more sustainable food systems.
Scaling within constraints
As 07 Foods evolves, its trajectory is shaped less by ambition than by constraint. Nigeria’s volatile economy, infrastructure gaps, and regulatory inconsistencies pose ongoing challenges to scaling food processing businesses. Whether Oladepo’s model can move beyond niche production to influence wider industry standards remains an open question.
What is clear is that 07 Foods represents a deliberate attempt to tackle food safety not as an abstract policy issue, but as a practical, operational problem, one shaped by everyday decisions about sourcing, processing, and accountability in Nigeria’s food economy.
