It was a brilliant business idea, targeting the niche market of locally produced instant tea using phytonutrients from locally grown and rarely processed wheat: sulikhar (Agriopyllum) and suuli (Psammochloa). Not many people, even in Mongolia, knew about the health benefits of these plants, that they were protein-rich and had antibacterial properties. As they are grown mainly in the sandy soil of the semi-desert areas of Mongolia, only elderly people in the Gobi region and Govi-Altai Province made use of them in ancient recipes. The name “Altai Tea” upheld this indigenous feature and was ideal for the tea, according to the mother and son duo.
The SDC-funded Youth Employment Promotion project created a model for the development and support of start-ups in 2016 to promote youth entrepreneurship and enable a start-up ecosystem. During that period, the start-up movement was just being seeded in the capital city and bigger cities in the northern provinces. The project reached out to the farthest provinces in western Mongolia, where the words “entrepreneurship” and “start-up” were alien to young people. The province labor authorities, in collaboration with the project, rolled-out start-up competitions in the province under the lead of Start-up Mongolia.
When Gantulga heard about the competition in his province, he was thrilled and nervous. He wondered if his business idea was feasible and if he would be able to win the competition. Before the competition, he and his friends had training from Start-up Mongolia on how to develop a business idea to attract funding, and they did! After winning the first-ever competition among young start-ups in Govi-Altai, Gantulga was enrolled in business accelerator training. Looking back, he is full of gratitude for the award of 10 million MNT, the business development training, and mentoring from experienced local business owners. These all contributed to his success as an entrepreneur. Today, with additional capacity and improved technology, the Altai Tea business has reached its breakeven point; packages of Altai Teа are available online and in the bigger supermarket chains in Ulaanbaatar and other cities for instant tea lovers.
Assessing the post-COVID impact on inflation and logistics, local market absorption capacity, and the unique artisanal production of phytonutrients in Mongolia, Gantulga doesn’t desire market expansion and greater production through the aggressive exploitation of rare natural resources. Instead, he is diversifying his business portfolio by investing in an entirely new social enterprise idea. To do so, he has drawn several school friends who graduated in Ulaanbaatar and remained there back to his province.
His dream is to minimize the digital divide in remote areas by helping children in his hometown learn coding. By getting equal access to digital education and skills, rural children and youth will be able to utilize their capacities and contribute to the sustainable development of their areas. As a young but experienced entrepreneur, Gantulga acknowledges the challenges of running such a social enterprise, but he also sees the endless potential of digital literacy in ushering in a new era of growth and development for the youth of Govi-Altai. He has already found a private company that shares the same vision to donate his first 15 million MNT.
