Silvia Rudicov is a kindergarten teacher in Costuleni village, Ungheni district, who has been milling for almost 20 years. The story of her business began in the spring of 2004, when she found herself unable to support her four children because of the low salary she was getting at the kindergarten.

"We have four children, I was working as a kindergarten teacher in the village on a very low salary and my husband was working abroad, far from home. We had such a hard time that I was always thinking what I could do for a little extra money," remembers Silvia Rudicov.

At that time, the inhabitants of Costuleni went to make wheat flour at the mill in the neighboring village. Even though it was a village with over 3,000 inhabitants, the Costulenians did not have a mill in the village and had to travel 8 kilometers to make bread flour.

"One day I ran out of wheat flour too. I went with the boy to the mill and when I got there, there were 20 people in line ahead of me and they were all from our village. Then I thought, why shouldn't we have a mill in Costuleni?" says the entrepreneur.

During the several hours she waited in line at the mill, the woman studied how the mill is built and what kind of equipment it has. By the time Silvia returned, she already had a plan on how to build her own mill in the village.

"In March I registered my business and by November I was already making the first flour. I took loans and invested a lot, especially in machinery. A few years later I managed to return all the money. As things started to go well, I bought another machine to process sunflower oil," she says.

Nowadays, the entrepreneur provides milling services not only for the habitants of Costuleni, but also for the neighboring villages: "In our area that's what people feed on. If You have wheat, you have bread. What more do you need? We always have a line at the mill. In Nisporeni there is no mill, in Ungheni many mills have closed and we have a lot of clients".

The biggest challenge for entrepreneurs was two years ago, when the energy crisis intensified. High electricity prices also affected the prices of milling services.

"The electricity price had risen and we had to increase the prices of services. Sometimes I felt sad when an older lady would come in and there was nothing to pay. I thought if I could install some photovoltaic panels, that would be great. And the prices would be lower and I would have more clients," remembers Silvia.