Who we are?
Headquartered in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Zafree transforms banana fiber and agricultural waste into high-quality, tree-free pulp, paper, and packaging solutions. In our mission to disrupt the paper industry, we have established our pilot factory, where we are actively producing and scaling our operations. Today, we have a growing team of around 40 employees, 90% of whom are women, reinforcing our commitment to empowering communities and fostering economic inclusion.
Established since 2018
Founded by Bethelhem Dejene Abebe, Zafree was born out of a vision to create a sustainable alternative to deforestation-driven paper production. Witnessing the environmental degradation caused by the traditional paper industry, Bethelhem was driven to find an innovative, waste-based solution that could protect forests while also creating economic opportunities.
Empowering Farmers, Protecting Forests, Innovating Paper
To become an internationally competitive manufacturer of high quality eco-friendly pulp & paper that are 100% free of trees for domestic and export markets supporting small farmers boost their income.
Transforming Waste into High-Quality Paper
We use agricultural waste raw materials such as banana farm waste and employ modern technology, qualified human resources, efficient management systems, and accredited production processes to produce high quality pulp & paper.
We aim to achieve these stats by 2030
Guiding Principles
Our values serve as the guiding principles that underpin everything we do at Zafree.
Meet Our Management
Meet the dedicated and talented team of Zafree Papers.
Degefech
Supervisor
