When Ghana native Charity Malia Dinko won a Diversity Immigrant Visa lottery and moved to the U.S., she knew that, as soon as she was able to start earning money, she’d try to send some home. In the beginning, that meant offering micro-loans to Ghanaian mothers who wanted to start businesses. Then, after two years at Reynolds Community College, Dinko transferred to UVA.
“Because of how hard it was to hold a job and attend UVA, I had to find a better solution to continue helping women when I was not working,” Dinko says. She went back to the drawing board.
The solution came in the form of shea butter—a natural vegan oil extracted from the shea nut, which grows almost exclusively in her home country. She co-founded Northshea soon thereafter, aiming to lift women from poverty by cutting the “exploitative middlemen” out of the supply chain. She partnered with women from her village already making shea butter—a tedious eight-step process—and began paying them a higher rate than they’d been earning.
Northshea’s line—everything from raw shea butter (a bestseller) to plush lemon whipped body butter (Dinko’s personal favorite)—answers the call for soft skin, feet, and hair, as well as a balm for minor injuries.
As Dinko says, “Everyone should have a jar of shea butter on their shelves at home.”
Find it at northshea.com, Darling, Rebecca’s Natural Foods, and The Elderberry.
