How one woman escaped Sudan's war to rebuild a women-led menstrual health factory in Egypt

The roar of warplanes and the incessant rattle of gunfire inundated the tranquillity of Safiya Elfadni's home after 15 April 2023. Living just a few kilometres from one of Khartoum's largest military bases — at that time besieged by the Rapid Support Forces — her world shifted overnight.

In her mind, a chaotic list of priorities began to collide: the wedding she was set to celebrate in just 12 days, the safety of family members scattered across a fracturing city, and perhaps most pressingly, her factory.

Since 2018, she had built this dream from the ground up, finally reaching full-scale production of reusable pads just three months before the first shots were fired.

Safiya faced a harrowing choice: abandon her life's work or transform her business into a lifeline for the millions of Sudanese women facing displacement.

Alongside her then-fiancé, Mohamed, she orchestrated a high-stakes move, relocating the factory and its workers to the relative safety of Port Sudan. 

Utilising their remaining raw materials and stock, they distributed over 100,000 reusable pads across the country in partnership with the 'One Million Pads' initiative, which sought to help the world's largest internally displaced population — numbering nearly 11 million — access vital menstrual hygiene products.

Three years later, Safiya and Mohamed have successfully established a new branch of the Alsalam Factory in Cairo, the city where they now reside.

The mission remains unchanged: providing affordable reusable pads and diapers while prioritising the employment of women in precarious circumstances — whether they are Sudanese refugees, local Egyptians, or other displaced nationalities navigating life in the capital. 

Reflecting on the philosophy behind her business, Safiya explains that it was designed for 'double impact.' By providing sustainable jobs to vulnerable groups and manufacturing a product that addresses critical health and affordability issues, she has created a model that is both socially resilient and environmentally conscious.

From prison workshops to social enterprise

While finishing her medical studies, Safiya volunteered with "Gharimat" in Sudan, where women are imprisoned for defaulting on small debts, often accumulated just to meet basic household needs. 

"The idea came from noticing that the people we paid for to get out of prison were ending up back there again," Safiya tells The New Arab.

"Returning a second time meant that their problem hadn't actually been solved yet, so we decided to work on something sustainable to solve the problem in the long term: we started by training them and then giving them a job opportunity to work.”

This was the catalyst for her charitable initiative, where these women were trained to design and manufacture tote bags for various organisations. However, the project's decisive turning point came with the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.

The technical skills the former inmates had acquired in sewing bags allowed them to shift seamlessly to meet the country's desperate demand for protective gear; they produced over two million reusable masks for government ministries and private corporations.

The momentum gained during the pandemic confirmed Safiya's vision: that a social enterprise could simultaneously create sustainable livelihoods and essential, eco-friendly products.

This success attracted the attention of a prominent Sudanese family business and leading investors, Elnefeidi Group, whose support has played a significant role in Alsalam's growth, alongside the Netherlands-based Challenge Fund for Youth Employment (CFYE) initiative. Their combined backing provided the necessary capital to establish Alsalam Factory in early 2023, specialising in the production of reusable sanitary pads and diapers.

"Before the war, we worked with the Canadian Embassy in Sudan distributing the product and educating about menstrual health," Safiya explains.

"There was a lot of positive feedback, but it requires awareness. Despite all women experiencing periods, there is not enough awareness or products. We are the only producer of sustainable pads both in Sudan and Egypt, and among the only three or four in the whole MENA region."

Starting again in Cairo

Rebuilding the business in Cairo was not easy. Safiya found herself navigating the profound stress of exile and family reunification while simultaneously managing remote operations for her factory in Sudan and laying the foundations for a new one in Egypt.

The arduous process began in January 2024, starting with the labyrinth of bureaucratic documentation and rigorous security clearances before she could secure a physical space and procure industrial machinery.

The doors finally opened in July 2025, marking the start of both vocational training and full-scale manufacturing.

The Alsalam Factory's mission remains two-fold. "We organise free sewing workshops for anyone eager to learn the craft," Safiya shares with The New Arab.

"We distribute flyers through Cairo's most underserved neighbourhoods, and every week, dozens of people arrive to learn, regardless of their residency status."

From these cohorts, many are recruited as full-time employees, the factory now providing livelihoods for 55 people —approximately 80 percent of whom are women.

A new country, however, demanded a new commercial strategy. While the Sudanese branch primarily served a humanitarian role — partnering with NGOs to provide affordable hygiene in emergency settings — the Egyptian market is driven by different consumer values. In Cairo, the appeal is rooted in wellness and environmental consciousness.

"Every customer has their own motivation, but in Egypt, our primary consumers are drawn to the sustainability of reusable pads and the fact that they are chemical-free and natural compared to disposable alternatives," Safiya notes.

"We are trying to build partnerships with local Egyptian women organisations to broaden our consumers to more vulnerable groups that may benefit from reusable pads, but for now, this is still in the early stages of discussions."

Designing work around women's lives

The interview with Safiya is interrupted several times — sales, social media and training teams queue up to speak to her, trying to make the most of her time in the office since, a few months ago, she gave birth to her son, Abu Bakr.

"Having a baby is a major challenge," she confesses. "Every day becomes a choice between staying home and going to the office."

Her husband, Mohamed, takes turns with her and makes sure to support her at every step. Still, Safiya says she wants to reach a point where women do not have to choose — or rely on their partners — in order to keep working.

"When we grow a bit more, I want to create a policy where the mothers working with us can bring their babies to work. I'd love to have a dedicated space so that during their breaks, they can look after them," she says.

"It does not only take a woman CEO to reach this, but a woman CEO who has been through the same struggles and can think of ways to solve them."

After all, Safiya has gone through much of what her Sudanese workers experienced in reaching Egypt: violence, fleeing with nothing, leaving family behind, and creating a new life with little to no support network to help care for themselves or their children.

In her case, the business has been a fundamental factor in coping with exile and with the uncertainty surrounding Sudan's future.

"Even in Sudan, the business was a huge part of my life. Even before I got married or had a child, I was building my business," she says. "So when it suddenly stopped, and we came to Egypt, I felt like I did not know who I was, nor what to do anymore."

She hopes the factory can continue to grow, not only as a business, but as a model for how women's needs are addressed.

In a landscape where menstrual health is often treated as an afterthought and vulnerable women as passive recipients of aid, Safiya's work suggests something else entirely: that the most durable solutions are often built by women who have lived the gaps themselves and decided to fill them.

Bianca Carrera is a freelance writer and analyst specialising in Middle Eastern and North African politics and society. She has written for Al Jazeera, The New Arab, Al-Quds Al-Araby, EU Observer and others. She is based between Spain, Morocco and Egypt

Follow her on Instagram: @biancacarrera_