Advocates make pitch to province for investment in Alberta’s Black entrepreneurs

Damilare Odumosu remembers the challenges of harvesting palm tree fruit as a kid on his family farm in Lagos, Nigeria. Two decades on, those pain points are the seeds of Odumosu’s latest start-up. CropMind is an Alberta and New Brunswick-based agri-tech company that automates manual processes for orchards with a growing clientele across North America.  The enterprise expanded with support from a federally funded program designed by the Edmonton-based Black Business Ventures Association. “BBVA is able to help BIPOC founders like myself leverage resources to be able to navigate the cultural barriers in meeting Canadian and North American customers,” said Odumosu, who started the business when he was a master’s student in Fredericton, N.B., but now lives in Calgary. It’s what the federal government had in mind when it launched the Black Entrepreneur Program in May 2021. Partnering with Black-led business organizations and financial institutions, the program invested $265 million across Canada. Funding has ended for most of the Alberta organizations or will do so in the next few months. The Black Business Ventures Association is among six Alberta-based organizations that formed the Alberta Black Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Alliance. Together they received about $15.5 million under the Black Entrepreneur Program to...