Circular Economy in the food sector IRP Programme 2025

European Union’s Global Gateway supports Sri Lankan businesses in the food sector

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Are you running a tech start-up or an SME with a positive impact on reducing food waste or loss or the reduction of single-use plastics in the food sector in Sri Lanka? Do you need support to get your business off the ground, scale up, increase your impact and make it ready for investments?

Then the CIRCULAR programmes are for you!

The Circular Economy in the Food Sector is a business development programme co-funded by the European Union that advances the Global Gateway strategy. The programme will support Sri Lankan start-ups and innovative small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the food sector. Through this call for applications, we are looking for creative solutions that tackle food waste and reduce single-use plastics.

Applications are open until 11 January and shall be submitted through the VC4A platform.

Overview

20
Closes January 11, 2025
Organizer GIZ SAIS – Sri Lanka
Targets Sri Lanka
Sectors
Agribusiness, Business services, Clean technology and energy, Education, Financial services, Healthcare, Waste management and recycling
Partner Program Circular Economy in the food sector IRP Programme 2025 image of Circular Logo
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What we offer

We offer two tailored programs to support start-ups and innovative SMEs at different stages of growth:

  1. Start-up Program: Designed to incubate new ventures and accelerate existing start-ups, helping them develop cutting-edge solutions, become investment-ready, and gain access to funding.
  2. SME Program: Geared toward slightly larger businesses that meet the SME criteria set by the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL), offers targeted support to help them scale and innovate.

We offer a wide range of services for selected companies:

  • Tailored Mentorship: One-on-one coaching with local and international experts, customized to meet your unique business needs.
  • Specialized Services: Access to key resources like legal advice, online marketing, digital product optimization, design, and coding to strengthen vital areas of your business.
  • Focused Training: Individual sessions on topics such as pitch preparation, growth strategies, data analytics, market analysis, marketing, and sales.
  • Networking & Exposure: Attend two in-person community events to showcase your business (we cover travel costs for one representative from each start-up).
  • Community Exchanges, Peer Learning & Collaboration: Participate in virtual group trainings, workshops, company visits, and topical exchanges with expert speakers and guests.
  • Investment & Partnerships: Get support with your fundraising strategy, preparation for investor rounds, and introductions to potential investors and partners.

We offer additional support on an as-needed basis:

  • Female Leaders Program: Empowering female founders and women in leadership through exclusive networking, peer-to-peer learning, and enhanced visibility, helping you stand out and succeed.
  • Digital Agency Support: Get tailored technical assistance to strengthen your digital strategy, optimize your online presence, and become more data-driven for smarter business growth.

Who can apply

To be eligible for the programme, your company must meet the following minimum requirements:

  • Be registered and operate in Sri Lanka
  • Be for-profit
  • Have a minimum viable product
  • Have a digital or tech-enabled solution (start-up) or be prepared to integrate a tech component into your business model (SMEs)
  • Have a management team of at least two people
  • Have evidence of traction (paying customers, first revenue)
  • Contribute to the reduction of food waste or loss or of single-use plastics for food

Timeline

About CIRCULAR Economy in the Food Sector

CIRCULAR is an European Union funded programme implemented by Expertise France, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH and is partly co-funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

Frequently asked questions

We do not invest ourselves, but we help you to make your business investment-ready and connect you with our network of investors and partners. Unlike other accelerator or investment programmes, we do not acquire shares of the companies that successfully applied to our IRPs.

We try to avoid accepting direct competitor companies from the same country into the same cohort.

Companies that graduate from the programme stay part of the CIRCULAR community: You can continue to participate in the monthly community and peer-learning events and we will keep you notified of upcoming fundraising & support opportunities. Motivated start-up founders can sign up to become mentors for start-ups in the next cohort.

No, currently we only offer the Investment Readiness Programme in English.

Yes, though we do not recommend going through multiple programmes simultaneously. The time commitment to different programmes at the same time will be challenging for you.

A Navigator is a member from the CIRCULAR team who will be your main contact point for the duration of the programme. Your navigator will visit you on-site (if possible), assess your support needs, help you set goals and milestones in your development plan, and regularly check-in with you on your progress.

Actively participate and ask questions in one of our upcoming info session. Please follow our Facebook page or LinkedIn page for more information.

The video is required for the application process. We are not looking for a professionally produced video; we want to see what you are working on, why you’re excited about it, how your team works together, and what makes you unique. You can record a video with your phone but make sure the audio quality is good.

Please reach out to VC4A directly for any support needed with your application after submission. You can reach out to Akram from the VC4A team. Please note that this is only intended for technical matters only (i.e. difficulty uploading a document, difficulty uploading pitch video, changing pitch deck version attached, etc.) other non-technical matters will be disregarded.

We use seven criteria to measure the investment readiness of a start-ups during the programme:

Founding team The competencies and structures of the founding team are improved (in the area of leadership, networking, management, evaluation, distribution of tasks in the team, etc.)
Data room & due diligence The business data (data room) is updated and improved and all necessary documents for a “due diligence” are available (e. g. pitch deck, annual balance sheet, accounting report etc.)
Data analytics  A digital system for monitoring the start-up’s user base is established and used (“data analytics”)
Market & competition analysis A market and competition analysis of the start-up for its own market and possible expansion markets is available and used
Marketing & Sales A strategy and catalogue of measures for marketing & sales are available and guide the actions of the founding team to scale the start-up
Product The digital product of the start-up is customer-focused and marketable (e.g. adapted to the target customer and target market, data security guaranteed, in line with national regulations, etc.)
Customer growth The start-up’s customer growth is positively improved


These indicators are based on what investors look at and addressing them will help you to raise investment. In addition to investment readiness, we measure the customer growth of the start-ups, their impact on the income of their customers, food security and climate adaptation, and of course the investments raised during the programme until one year after.

If you have worked with GIZ as an employee or contractor, please let us know and indicate this clearly in the application. Most of the time, this is not an issue. If you have questions in advance, reach out to us via giz-srilanka@giz.de.

We highly recommend that your founding team works in the company full-time so that you can focus on your business. But we fully understand your decision not to quit your previous job, especially if your start-up is still early stage.

We don’t exclude applications just because they have a single founder. But we look for teams with a range of complementary skills. Therefore, we highly recommend you seek co-founders who balance your skillset. If you are a single founder, you should build a strong management team around you.

No, it is not.

No! We treat all data and information given in the application in a proper and confidential manner. We take measures to protect your data and information, as this guarantees our core business model and good reputation.

No, you just have to fill out the application form.

Yes, it is not a requirement that your technology development is done in-house.

Please get in touch with us at giz-srilanka@giz.de and tell us about the company and why you think they’ll be a good fit.

Yes, VC4A is our partner supporting us in the selection of start-ups. They also actively reach out to companies on our behalf and inform them about the open call for application.

Team

Activity