Her youthfulness belies the focus and confidence with which she talks about her “business ambitions,” her determination to transform her fledgling entrepreneurial pursuits into “something big” – something that can challenge and eventually replace imported agro-produce that have long been fixtures on local supermarket shelves – and which she has come to see as choking off the market growth of locally produced options waiting impatiently to take what she considers to be their rightful places.
At 21, Kelshine Griffith comes across as having somewhat different priorities to many young women in her own age group. Having just completed the 2018-2019 agro-processing course at the Guyana School of Agriculture, her immediate priority is to transform her end-of-course practical assignment – a Sweet Potato Cake Mix with which she aims to challenge the legendary Betty Crocker brand on the local market – into a countrywide household product.
There is a catchiness to the brand name SHINE, sculpted off the latter part of her own christian name and though the packaging that displays the product is clearly in need of some measure of refinement (a fact which she readily acknowledges), there is no bridling her ‘talking up’ of the product itself.
