The Global Meaningful Travel Map

Jiranileo

Jiranileo

Immersive African food tours connecting guests with authentic flavors while empowering women and youth through tourism.

OUR EXPERIENCES

Jiranileo runs African food tours for the curious traveler. Africa is home to 1.3+ billion people with millions of local food cultures. We’re growing the gastronomy tourism sector in Zambia and in the region to enable travelers to get a true taste of the places they visit. We offer three food tour products: home-hosted meals, neighborhood food tours, and cooking classes. We proudly empower women and youth as expert guides, opening doors for them in the tourism industry and ensuring guests connect with authentic flavors and rich cultural stories. Our guest said it best: "It was a fantastic, authentic, immersive, cultural experience with the best traditional food I've had."

ABOUT US

Jiranileo, operating as Jiranileo Tourism Limited Zambia, is the first gastronomy tourism company focused on Africa. Our women-owned small business creates and sells gastronomy tourism experiences across multiple African countries. Our mission is to generate meaningful income for women and youth by connecting them with travelers seeking culturally rich food experiences.

IMPACT

We are a women-owned business that has trained over 60 women and youth in Zambia as food tour guides, expanding income streams for individuals and their communities (Sustainable Development Goals 4, 5, & 8). Our tours are conducted in neighborhoods that are not currently reached by the tourism sector, such as the street food neighborhood of Lusaka and the central food market of Livingstone. We never stage poverty, romanticize hardship, or use misleading images. Instead, we focus on the authentic beauty of everyday life, the people who make the food, and the real markets, homes, and restaurants we visit. Our food tours promote family and tribal recipes and traditional cooking techniques, giving tourists an authentic, hands-on cultural experience while reinforcing local pride in culinary tradition. Every tour meal is built around fresh, locally sourced ingredients, reducing our environmental footprint while celebrating the flavors of the season (SDG 12).

DETAILS

To learn more, contact: info@jiranileo.com

What are your minimum and maximum group sizes?
1 - 8

Do you require visitors to pre-book?
Yes

Do you have group rates?
Yes

Do you pay commissions to travel advisors?
Yes

What languages do you offer your services in?
English (if our hosts do not speak English as their native language, they use a friend or neighbor to translate to English)

When are you open?
365 days / year

What accommodations do you make for people living with disabilities?
In general, African communities are not conducive for people with physical disabilities. We would need to discuss the specific accessibility requirements of an individual to jointly make a decision if our tour can accommodate them.