The GoGettaz initiative is part of the Generation Africa movement which seeks to inspire the next generation of African agripreneurs, connecting them to the resources they need to move their businesses successfully from idea to scale. Next to the annual GoGettaz Agripreneur Prize which VC4A has been a partner of since 2019, we collaborate around the creation of  a vibrant online community platform with over 9,000 registered agri-professionals across the globe who are interacting, learning, providing mentorship and sharing experiences on youth agripreneurship and providing solutions to current challenges in the food system.

The GoGettaz Community platform boasts of multimedia capabilities with a great enhanced look with major sections that are easily accessible.

On the homepage is a welcome message to all new members with details on the benefits of being part of this wide global online community. Once you register, your name will appear on the list under latest members for other network members to see new members and their respective ventures.

Every year, Generation Africa hosts the coveted GoGettaz Agripreneur Prize Competition which attracts over 5,000 applications and recognizes outstanding youth agripreneurs who are revolutionizing agriculture in Africa. The Gogettaz community platform has a page dedicated to finalists of the annual competition for agripreneurs, where you can learn about new agri-tech technologies and solutions helping farmers increase their production as well as household incomes. In case you would like to learn more from these agribusiness ventures or invest in their agri-enterprises, as a member you can also contact them directly and also connect with other agripreneurs who are doing exemplary work.

The opportunity section is the most exciting! The team regularly updates the platform with new investment opportunities, acceleration and incubation programs, competitions and fellowships amongst others which are ideal for agritech-startups who are in different stages of growth. There is always something for every agripreneur! Take advantage of these opportunities and make your application today!

Would you like to be updated with what is happening within the GoGettaz Community featuring also the GoGettaz alumni on what they have been upto? Read the current articles which mainly feature interviews and updates on the incredible work led by youth agripreneurs on their actions towards promoting food and nutritional security.  Stay updated and follow the different social media pages!

Increase knowledge on how to scale your agri-startup to the next level by enrolling today at the VC4A Startup Academy which is readily accessible from the homepage. The virtual Academy is open to all founders of agri-enterprises at the different stages of growth who would like to grow their agribusinesses. Start your Business Course is ideal for founders who are in the phase of developing ideas and testing their products to determine if its ready for the market, Grow your business course is aimed at startups that are already operational and are in the phase of scaling up their operations while “Finance your Business” course is for entrepreneurs who are seeking funding to raise their capital. A certificate will be issued upon successful completion of the courses.

The members page contains profiles of all registered members on the agribusiness community platform; this page enhances networking with other members and allows you to exchange information amongst each other. Take advantage of this great opportunity and engage peers as well as other key stakeholders registered on the platform.

Lastly, if you have an agribusiness and its already operational, ensure you create a profile of your venture on the platform. This will help enhance your venture’s visibility and investors who are interested in your agri-enterprise can also reach out to you. Create your venture profile today!

Signing up is easy! Register for free to be part of this agribusiness community!

We are excited to have you on board!

Did you know the amount of food loss in Africa exceeds the total value of food aid received in Sub Saharan Africa over the last decade? These estimates by the World Bank further reveal significant volumes of food are lost after harvest. Ironically, food insecurity is still a menace affecting more than 100 million people, a situation worsened by severe drought in some parts of the Continent such as Horn of Africa, crop failures, conflicts, changing weather patterns and poor post-handling practices by different stakeholders along the food value chain.

A lot of attention is centered towards increasing food production as compared to efforts on reducing food loss and food waste. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), 1.3 billion tons of food is lost or wasted annually while 870 million people go hungry in Africa. Some of the major causes of food loss include: poor handling of produce at farm level, processing, packaging and during transport. Insufficient knowledge of post-harvest technologies and handling practices is also a contributing factor.

Agriculture is inherently a risky business because its products are perishable; meaning its likely to spoil, decay or become unsafe for consumption if not stored well. This necessitates the use of cold storage equipments to prolong shelf life of agricultural produce while preventing food loss and increasing income for farmers and traders. Cold storage involves use of renewable energy/electric equipment to preserve perishable food such as fruits, vegetables, milk and meat from going bad due to unwanted fungi or pathogens. With cold storage equipments, one can regulate temperature ideal for the product being refrigerated, transport it to different markets (local & international) without fear of spoilage, its cost effective and facilitates a longer shelf life for different agriculture/livestock value addition products. Traditional methods of food preservation included: drying, salting, frying, fermentation and smoking.

The Food Loss Reduction Advantage Report by IFAD recommends linking farmers to profitable markets for them to invest in reducing losses; increased support  to farmers and traders for them to acquire affordable cold storage equipment’s, improved transport infrastructure to access markets and reduce risk of damaging produce, an enabling environment that supports food loss reduction into government(s) national agricultural strategies and  lastly, training of farmers on good post-harvest handling and storage of crops will contribute to reduction in food loss.

These GoGettaz have been on the forefront with cold storage innovations that harness renewable energy to preserve and prolong shelf life of agricultural/livestock produce. The cold storage equipments are affordable, and farmers can focus on increasing their production without fear of food spoilage which contributes to a reduction of their income.

 ColdHubs – Nigeria

Nigeria has a tropical climate characterized by high temperatures and relative humidity which can contribute to food spoilage through fungal or bacteria decay if not stored well, forcing farmers and traders to sell their surplus food products at throw away prices to avoid huge losses.

Open air markets are common however, the number of cold storage facilities are insufficient due to unreliable electricity supply; this affects farmers, retailers and food supply chain actors leading to reduced incomes due to food spoilage.

“ColdHubs” a scale-up by Bright Benjamin Igbokwe provides refrigeration services at food production and consumption centers enabling farmers/traders to store, preserve food and extend  shelf life of their agricultural products from 2-21 days. The produce is placed in clean plastic crates which are stacked inside the cold room and payment plan comprises pay-as-you store subscription model and a daily flat rate for each crate of food they store.

ColdHubs bear the capital cost of deploying the cold rooms, saving farmers and traders the cost of buying their own unit which is very expensive.

The solar powered walk-in cold room is made of 120mm insulating cold room panels to retain cold. Energy from solar panels mounted on the roof-top of the cold room are stored in high-capacity batteries, which feed into  an inverter and then the refrigerating unit.

Today, the startup has successfully installed and commissioned 14 ColdHubs serving up to 615 farmers. Security, however, is their biggest concern as ColdHubs are designed to be installed in outdoor markets. To prevent theft, the team only deploys the hubs where there is adequate security.

Solar Freeze – Kenya

Solar Freeze is a pioneering mobile cold storage unit powered by renewable energy with an aim of serving rural smallholder farmers. Developed by Dysmus Kisilu, solar freeze is a one stop turnkey portable off-grid toolkit for localized food production containing a complete ecosystem of smart farm technologies to enhance agricultural productivity, from 3kWp solar power and micro-drip irrigation to solar powered cold storage enabling small holder farmers reduce their post-harvest loss and increase their income by selling their  produce at optimum prices as opposed to  previously when circumstances forced them to sell their products cheaply due to fear of losses as a result of spoilage.

Users can regulate the temperature of their products and use the solar powered cold rooms to transport fresh produce via energy efficient trucks to reach consumers. Its milk dispensing ATM’s machine harnesses renewable energy.

Using its micro franchise model, Solar Freeze empowers youth and women to own and operate the solar powered IoT ‘Smartfarm’ kits and the portable solar powered cold storage units. This model and approach enable rural prosperity through productive equipment access.

Solar Freeze has led to reduced food loss and waste of fresh produce, increased income to women and youth; elimination of diesel-powered generators, availability of cheap fresh produce and use of eco-friendly recyclable bottles when purchasing milk.

Baridi – Solar powered Cooling in East Africa’s Livestock Value Chain

In 2018, Tracy Kimathi, Founder of Baridi (meaning cold in Swahili) developed a solar mini-grid whose immediate value was to provide clean, affordable electricity to rural pastoralists in Kenya. It is during this time that she realized meat preservation was a challenge by many and embarked on a journey of expanding off-grid solar preservation within East Africa’s meat markets with an aim to assess whether cold storage facilities for beef and dairy storage are beneficial and financially viable application as a driver of food security in livestock value-chains.

The solar powered cold rooms target commercial urban meat vendors; individual specification includes: 5kWp stand-alone solar energy generation, 18kWh Lithium-Ion battery storage and a 20ft containerized cold storage facility. The cold rooms have the potential to preserve over 292,000kg of meat annually, decrease 30% post-slaughter losses, 50% increase in product lifespan and add a yearly economic benefit of €5250 for a vendor renting 1m3 of cold space.

Baridi has led to provision of quality standardized and locally sourced meat to 18,500 households, increased income and reduction of post-harvest losses, job creation, self-generation of electricity through solar PV.

BMTA&C – Morocco

In Morocco, the scenario is similar to other African countries where inadequate storage facilities force farmers to sell their surplus products which are not stored in cold rooms at very low prices to avoid spoilage. Perturbed by this situation Boutaina, Mounir, Sara, Benlafqih  and Carl, co-founders of BMTA&C developed an off-grid cold storage solution which does not require electricity. This has enabled farmers to store their harvests and preserve their quality over a long term, thus promoting food security through off-grid cold storage solutions as well improving their post-harvest handling habits leading to increased incomes. BMTA&C have also adopted a natural refrigerant that represents a green alternative for its minimal levels of Ozone Depletion Potential and Global Warming Potential.

Farmers and traders pay for the cold storage units using pay as you use business model which includes a daily rental fee for every crate stored and a fixed competitive fee for those storing their products for a longer period.

To enhance efficiency, BMTA&C has digitized its business management operations which is also available offline through USSD for those who do not have smartphones. Digitization enhances safety during payment and clients access extra services remotely. Plans are underway to address challenges in the supply chain such as access to capital and insurance services.

Solaristique – Nigeria

Nigeria’s annual food losses is over 12 billion USD, a worrying trend attributed to inadequate cold storage units and worsened by unstable power supply.

Nnaedozie George Idoko, founder of Solaristique, provides cold storage services using recycled old freezers and refrigerators which are converted into solar-powered coolers/freezers to help reduce food losses and food waste. The solar coolers are double chambered, making it possible to last for days without adequate sunlight hence ideal for off-grid applications and requires no battery backup.

This has led to a reduction of GHG emissions because food is stored in the solar freezers. Spoilt food emits methane gasses which are 12 times more potent than carbon. Through recycling, the team reduces electronic waste from refrigerators, freezers, and air conditioners which are assembled to make the solar freezers.

One of its products ‘Ayogu’ is a detachable tricycle mobile solar freezer specially designed for cooling drinks, dairy products enroute to markets, stalls, or homes. Once at the destination, the freezer and the solar panel can easily be detached from the tricycle enabling consumers to get fresh products. This prototype model is a 150 litre capacity and can be scaled up to 1000 liters capacity.

Some unique features of the coolers/freezers include Internet of Things (IoT) and a management information system (MIS) that helps track food loss reduction data while using the solar freezers. Plans are underway to monetize these data which can be traded in the carbon market using blockchain technology.

Solaristique generates its revenue from sale of solar freezers, conversion of normal freezers to solar freezers, and after-sales support. Additional revenue is made from sale of bricks, interlocks, and roofing sheets made from plastic wastes.

Stay Updated! Follow our page GoGettaz and see how young agripreneurs are transforming Africa’s food system.

Growth is crucial for long term survival of any business with a competing edge in the market; this however is not an easy path for many startup founders as some startups thrive after inception, others take time to take off while others completely fail due to varied reasons depending on the nature of business. Some of the key ingredients for a startup to flourish include: responding to changing market needs, cordial working business partnerships, launch of new products and diversification of products which widens the customer base hence an increase in sales.

Tough economic conditions, reluctance to respond to changing marketing needs, conflicts arising from partnerships, poor business models and market penetration strategy are some of the reasons which hinder growth of some startups.

The VC4A Startup Academy has e-courses tailored specifically for different startup needs depending on their stages of growth. The courses are developed and designed with inputs from key experts in the industry who have experience in supporting startups. These experts are available on the platform and one can contact them directly for support or further guidance.

Are you ready to grow your business? Start the journey today by enrolling for the “Grow your business” course which targets startup founders who are looking forward to increasing traction for their products or services and would like to expand their business operations.

The course is well structured and is offered in four modules with in-depth content that will help startup founders transition smoothly to the next level of their business growth. The course is available online for free and anyone across the globe can sign up and complete it at their own convenient time.

The first module introduces startup founders to key critical insights necessary for startup growth such as how to make sound business development decisions, what to consider before expanding to other geographic markets and the does and don’ts when thinking of product diversification.

Business models are key for any startup, they help to define the structure of the business, market needs, target clients, short and long term vision for the business as well as legal and ethical issues that every business must address. This is covered in depth in the second module for startup founders to gain adequate knowledge on different business models, a visual illustration of the business model canvas and reasons why some startups fail while others succeed.

The third module is the most interesting! Here startup founders learn techniques on building successful corporate partnerships which will help enhance their expertise and knowledge in their field of operation. In  addition, the module has a unit to guide startup founders on how to do B2B sales and the importance of mentors and advisers while expanding their businesses.

The fourth module is all about success! How can startup founders design a chart curve for success and  tips for building traction to the business.

These course modules make learning easy and engaging and are offered in form theoretical breakdowns which involves an introduction to key concepts in business; Videos of leading business professionals, entrepreneurs and investors, sharing expert advice, quizzes to test your understanding of the course modules and useful learning materials for further reference. A certificate will be issued after successful completion of the course.

Other courses available at VC4A Startup Academy include: ‘Start your business’ course for founders who are in the process of developing ideas and testing if their products are market fit while ‘Finance your business’ course is for entrepreneurs who are looking to raise external capital. Additionally, “legal business” course is aimed at founders who want to learn more about the legal implications of setting up their business and the funding concepts for a first round of investment.

Take advantage of our courses today and grow your business!

Lilian Nakigozi was born and bred in Katanga, an urban slum in Uganda which is home to approximately 20,000 people. Life in the slums is usually not easy with the majority of occupants living in houses made of mud, wood, and those lucky in brick-made houses. This is worsened by environmental pollution in their surroundings that often leads to contamination of surface and groundwater, ecosystem degradation, soil pollution as well as emission of greenhouse gasses.

Having been raised solely by her mother in a family of nine siblings, Nakigozi would see her mother work extra hard to feed them. Getting food on the table was a challenge and this contributed to the death of her younger sister. These experiences influenced her to have an ambition of changing the lives of urban slum dwellers when an adult; this she does today by offering them an alternative source of income through vertical farming to promote food and nutrition security.

Vertical farming is the practice of growing crops in a vertical manner on top of each other instead of horizontal which is used by many especially in areas where land is vast. Vertical farming leads to proper utilization of space and higher crop yields. One can practice vertical farming even in their home balconies as long as there are good conditions to nurture the crop.

In 2018 Lilian started Women Smiles Uganda, a social enterprise formed by like-minded young female social entrepreneurs with the aim of educating women on vertical farming because of inadequate land availability in urban areas to practice farming. They also manufacture vertical gardens and sell them affordably to women, especially those in urban slums of Kampala where there is hardly any land to grow crops.

Today, food scarcity is a challenge, a situation worsened by changing climatic conditions, use of outdated farming techniques by smallholder farmers, inadequate access to credit and insurance services, limited land and poor post handling practices. The 2022 Global Food Crises  mid-year update reveals approximately 140 million people in Africa face acute food insecurity and at least one in five Africans go to bed hungry. In Uganda, the food scarcity situation was categorized as serious in the 2021 Global Hunger index report  by Concern Worldwide and Welthungerhilfe.

Why women?

Women contribute to 76% of agricultural workforce however there productivity is considered low compared to their male counterparts, one of it being shared challenges both genders face as small holder farmers and the other one is inequity challenges faced by women as a result of cultural barriers such as land ownership, less decision making power, inadequate access to credit and financial services, insufficient agricultural training and education and lack of infrastructure.

With increasing urban population and as a strategy to reduce gender gap in the sector, there is a need to educate women on more alternative means of farming such as hydroponics which involves growing plants without soil but in gravel or liquid with added nutrients. Women smiles Uganda not only make and sell vertical farms to its clients but also link them directly to agents who sell improved seeds without them passing through middle men. Women also benefit from additional training depending on their needs such as making compost manure, record keeping skills, drip irrigation amongst other good farming practices. Today, Women Smiles Uganda has expanded its market base to urban slums such as Kimombasa, Katanga, Katwe, Makindye, Old Kampala and Bwaise which are home to almost 35% of Kampala’s population.

“We have a robust marketing team which moves across different slums to identify organized women groups to educate them on vertical farming. Those willing and finance is a challenge are allowed to pay in installments for the vertical farms. Our marketing also comprises the use of social media, adverts, talk shows both on tv and radio,” says Nakigozi.

Challenges

In 2018, Uganda introduced social media tax and abolished it in 2021 by introducing a 12% tax on internet data which makes it expensive for startups to market their products and services online. Women Smiles Uganda managed to overcome this challenge through door to door visits to urban slum dwellers.

Other challenges include high costs of production for vertical farms and as a women led manufacturing startup, their aim is to have 98% of staff as women however, this is not the case as there are inadequate professional female engineers to work with. Their goal is to set up workshops for manufacturing of vertical  farms in different regions to reduce the cost of production.

On International Women’s Day we celebrate some of the achievements and contributions of GoGettaz women who have gone an extra mile to start their agribusinesses, empowered fellow women and created additional  job opportunities.

African women have an integral role in agriculture, which is the backbone of most economies. The African Development Bank (AfDB) estimates 50% of labor is from women who spend approximately two-thirds of their time on agricultural activities contributing almost 60%-80% of the continent’s food, yet some have limited access to key resources such as land ownership, financial services, education, knowledge and skills related to agriculture and, management of agricultural resources to enable them increase their production.

With digitization of agriculture taking an upward trend and many agricultural services such as advisory and access to markets technologies available online; many farmers – including women and youth – are still left behind due to limited funds to purchase smart phones and lack of or unreliable internet connection in rural areas where agriculture is mostly practiced.

This year’s International Women’s Day theme “DigitALL: Innovation and technology for gender equity” is aligned to Generation Africa’s work in the last 5 years of inspiring the next generation of African agripreneurs who are providing innovative solutions in the agriculture sector by connecting them to the resources they need to move their agri-enterprises from idea to scale leading to increased food production, nutrition security as well as creation of new jobs.

As much as there has been considerable progress towards achieving gender equity, there is need increase efforts on promoting women agripreneurship, enactment of good policies that favor their businesses,  involvement in key decision-making, better working conditions, increased incubation support to their agri-enterprises and access to financial opportunities to help them scale their agribusinesses.

Meet some of our GoGettaz women who are doing incredible work and solving some of the food system challenges.

Ifeoluwa Olatayo – Founder Soupah Farm-en-Market Limited, Nigeria

Often, the middlemen traders have been described as the biggest obstacle to increasing a farmer’s income and reason for high agricultural food prices. A middleman is someone who plays an intermediary role in a distribution or transaction chain between farmers and traders.

In Nigeria, over 9 million people prefer to buy their agricultural produce from the informal food retail market. Approximately, 70% of traders in these markets who sell perishable produce suffer from economic shortage from the operations of the middlemen who control  food prices and when the costs are high, the same is transferred to consumers.

Soupah Farm-en-Market Limited, a startup by Ifeoluwa Olatayo aims to remove exploitative middlemen in the food value chain by contributing towards low food prices, increased income for retailers, cutting down post-harvest losses as well as reducing the amount of methane emission into the atmosphere.

Using its procurement purchase platform technology, Soupah Farm-en-Market Limited bridges the gap between rural farmers and urban retailers with an end-to-end supply chain traceability leading to less wastage and affordable food for urban consumers.

Agricultural products are sourced directly from rural farmers and sorted depending on the demand. Using a QR code, retailers scan to get additional information of the product such as origin of the produce, time harvested, cost, quantity available and the duration the produce will take on transit. Once the retailer chooses his/her desired agricultural produce and payment is done, a dispatch is made to their destination.

This platform has the ability to collect various data sets that can be used to transform distribution channels, enhance transparency, end-to-end food traceability and information sharing across the supply chain hence eliminating exploitative middle men in the value chain.

Ifeoluwa Olatayo is in the process of integrating block chain technology to facilitate direct, secure and fast transactions from farmers (with offline capabilities for rural farmers) to record all food data, trade transactions and food traceability.

Naledi Magowe – Co-Founder Brastorne Enterprises, Botswana

Brastorne’s Enterprises, a startup by Naledi Magowe that leverages digital infrastructure by collaborating with telco networks and offers an alternative to low-cost data to reach poor rural poor smallholder farmers using their mobile devices.

One of its products, mAgri is a USSD mobile application helping farmers’ access timely agricultural information ranging from farming tips to improve yields, market-prices and most importantly weather alerts and early warning for climate catastrophes that can adversely affect their production. The service has been widely adopted by farmers in rural areas because it does not require any internet connection.

Overall, the mAgri platform led to over 250% increase in yields for farmers, 115% increased income for female farmers and over 77% savings on communication and information access for users.

Fily Keita – Founder Agrowomen, Mali 

In Mali, approximately 95% of sesame seeds grown are exported outside the country and only 5%  consumed locally while 90% of rice grown is also exported and only 10 % is consumed locally representing the huge market potential especially through value addition of its products.

With this realization, Fily Keita formed Agrowomen, a startup that adds value to local cereals and oilseeds by processing sesame and making cold press natural sesame oil, sesame snacks, cakes and local made rice “Malodouma” (tasteful rice).

Agrowomen works closely with women farmers and cooperatives who supply them with raw materials which are processed to various sesame bi-products leading  to women empowerment, increased job opportunities and  food security.

The startup also connects small farmers and cooperatives to national and international buyers and has partnered with supermarkets, food shops and online markets who sell their products.

Siny Samba – Co-Founder Le Lionceau, Senegal

With a strong passion in the food industry, Siny Samba formed “Le Lionceau”, a startup that utilizes local organic raw materials with high nutritional value to improve nutrition health of mothers and babies while strengthening the local food value chain with ready to use purees adapted to their nutritional needs and made from local organic ingredients such as moringa, millet and baobab fruit which are processed in the company’s semi-industrial plant.

Almost 46.4 million babies are born annually in Africa who need proper nutrients to stay healthy and strong to protect themselves against diseases. Upon doing research, Samba realized the market was flooded with imported nutritional products which were very expensive and decided to take advantage of this business opportunity by offering affordable nutritional  products to women and children which are free from artificial preservatives and key in promoting physical growth and brain development of children to tackle malnutrition.

Joana Paintsi – Co-Founder Women and Youth in Bee Keeping and Value Chain (WYN-BG), Ghana

More than 6.6 million households in Ghana consume at least 1kg of honey annually. Integrating beekeeping into crop farming practices increases pollination and doubles the crop productivity whilst at the same time producing high quality bee products.

WYN-BG, a startup led by Joana Paintsil trains smallholder farmers on sustainable farming practices and urges them to integrate beekeeping to promote biodiversity. Some of the bi-products from bees include: honey, beeswax, pollen, propolis  and a super immune booster nutrient supplement made from honey and other nutrient rich herbs to produce an all-natural, inclusive nutrient supplement for all age groups.  This has enabled farmers to make additional income from the sale of honey bi-products.

Today, the startup has trained and supported over 500 smallholder farmers on beekeeping and employed over  50 youth who are involved in the production and sale of bee products and natural cosmetics.

Happy International Women’s Day to all GoGettaz!

Generation Africa and VC4A recently launched a bi-monthly webinar series as part of ongoing efforts to enhance vibrancy on the GoGettaz Community platform and promote knowledge sharing on key thematic areas with focus on youth agripreneurship.

The first webinar series on the Role of youth in transforming Africa’s Agriculture sector brought together different stakeholders including youth agripreneurs across Africa to connect and learn from the 2022 GoGettaz Agripreneur Prize winner and finalist, Esther Kimani, Founder FarmerLifeline Technologies, Kenya, and Mochesane Mpali, Co-Founder Lema Agrivest, Lesotho, respectively who shared insights on how their startups were contributing towards sustainable food systems.

Esther Kimani – 2022 GoGettaz Agripreneur Prize Winner 

Esther Kimani, Founder FarmerLifeline Technologies has developed a crop pest and disease detection device which is mounted on the farm to help farmers detect if there is any pest or disease in the farm. The device has scanners which rotate frequently and captures images of crops in the farm and incase a pest or disease is identified, a farmer is notified through SMS on their mobile phone with information on the crops infested, type of pest and disease detected and a recommendation of what the farmer should apply as a solution.

With support from various partners including Generation Africa, Kimani has managed to increase the scan radius of the device in the farm from 100 meters to 600 meters with current focus being enabling the scanners to rotate upto 360 degrees instead of the current 180 degrees.

The uptake of the device has been more in rural areas where farming is mostly practiced, and FarmerLifeline technologies works closely with cooperatives to reach more farmers. On climate change, the startup advises farmers to use carbon negative fertilizers or those with low amounts of carbon to reduce the amount of the gas released onto the atmosphere.

“Youth should not shy away from accelerator/incubation programs that do not offer direct financing and take advantage of learning new skills essential in managing startups such as marketing, financial management, team management and bankable business models”, says Esther Kimani

Mochesane Mpane – 2022 GoGettaz Finalist 

The 2019 food inflation in Lesotho inspired Mochesane Mpali to seek solutions on how he could help people living in urban areas mitigate soaring food prices. This is how Lema Agrivest was formed, a hydroponics and aquaponics farming startup with key focus on creating an inclusive ecosystem for smallholder farmers and vulnerable communities to be food secure. Hydroponics is the growing of crops without soil in a controlled environment which involves ensuring the water has enough nutrients essential for crops.  Some of their services by Lema Agrivest include:

1. Design and manufacturing of hydroponics equipment’s.
2. Capacity building farmers on the benefits of hydroponics.
3. Plans are currently ongoing to have a hydroponic farmers association that will help farmers access more markets.

Being the pioneer of hydroponics farming in Lesotho, Mpali has been resilient despite challenges that came along the way such as creating awareness and changing farmers mindset on benefits of hydroponic farming, lack of investor appetite, challenges of linking the actual business model to the industry and sourcing for local materials to manufacture hydroponics equipments locally as importing them was very expensive.

Mpali advised upcoming agripreneurs to first gain traction of their agribusiness before expanding, this includes creating consumer awareness on the availability and benefits of their product.

For those looking forward to taking part in the 2023 GoGetttaz Agripreneur Prize Competition, Mpali emphasized on the need of understanding their agribusiness well and having confidence while pitching it to the selected panel of judges.

Specifically, the webinar aimed to:

• Profile young agripreneurs, facilitate linkages between stakeholders and promote knowledge sharing and learnings on successful models of supporting youth in agribusiness.

• Introduce Generation Africa team and the GoGettaz online community platform to participants in the webinar.

A demonstration of key features available on the GoGettaz online community platform was done with an emphasis on the benefits of being part of this online community which today has over 9,000 registered members comprising agriculture sector players across the globe. Some of these benefits include free registration, access to latest agripreneurship opportunities such as grants; competitions; incubation and accelerator programs and; fellowship opportunities; exciting articles featuring different agripreneurs showcasing how they are transforming the value chain, listing of youth ventures, continued networking amongst members in the community through the members page and the VC4A Academy which has free courses tailored for different startups needs to help them grow. A certificate is always issued after completion of each course.

Here is a recap of the webinar proceedings!

Our next webinar series will be in April 2023! Stay tuned for upcoming details.

Homegrown agritech solutions with incredible potential are fuelling investor confidence in the future of African agriculture. Investment in Africa agritech has grown from US$19 million between 2016-2018 to almost US$60 million in 2020 and a whopping US$95 million in 2021. Although this is not an indication of the on-the-ground implementation of agritech as of yet, it is certainly an indication of where things are going.  

Pitch AgriHack contestants with impressive business models have consistently shown that great innovations will be rewarded with investment. Rural Farmers Hub, a 2021 winner of Pitch AgriHack, has received capital investment and competition winnings from a long list of accelerators, incubators, grant funders, contests, and investors, including the Africa Startup Initiative, *seedstars, and the Africa AgTech and Inclusive Insurance Challenge, along with cash grants as an Impact Award winner in the GoGettaz Agripreneur Prize. Similarly, J-Palm Liberia has been the recipient of funding from USAID and the elea Center for Ethics in Globalization, with many award wins including the African Entrepreneurship Award and the Africa Business Heroes Awards.

What makes some businesses more likely to receive attention from investors? 

The answer is impact. 

Of the twelve previous Pitch AgriHack finalists, every business has a direct positive impact on farming communities. 

SayeTech reduces the time it takes to thresh one acre of cereal crops from two weeks to two hours with a with their multi-crop thresher. MyFugo improves cow health and dairy production with data from smart cow collars that informs their financial investment choices. Ngwala Inventions make biopesticides and fertilizers available to isolated rural farmers with an automated dispensing system linked to USSD mobile money payments.   

Ventures like Farm Kiosk and GiGs by The Golazo Project are focussed using web platforms to link youth to opportunities. Farm Kiosk connects young people to available land and the agri-value chain actors they will need to be successful farmers, while Golazo’s platform links farmers searching for workers with youth looking for jobs. 

Previous Pitch AgriHack winners, like GrowAgric and FarmCrowdy, are focussed on providing finance and insurance to small and medium scale farmers. They protect their investments and get long-term results by using agronomic data and modern best practises to train their farmers. Ensuring success, they also provide the inputs farmers require and find buyers for their produce. 

For businesses that show the potential for real impact that improves the lives of people in local communities, investment channels are likely to increase in the future. This is especially true for agritech ventures that help farmers to build climate resilience and improve local food security.

Long-term improvements through investment

Agricultural technologies, better data, and far more sustainable farming practices are unlocking the potential of the African food system. With local communities and local entrepreneurs taking initiative, the pervasive problems of hunger, malnutrition, and poverty are slowly being addressed.  

In March 2022, Nigerian agritech company ThriveAgric and Kenyan Apollo Agriculture raised almost $100 million in financing to grow their businesses. Importantly, like GrowAgric and FarmCrowdy, these two companies in turn provide financing solutions to Africa’s numerous smallholder farmers. 

As AgFunder reports, with almost “60% of the continent’s population” working as smallholder farmers, agricultural technology companies focussed on provision of finance, insurance, agronomic support services, and training for smallholders are at the forefront of the battle against poverty and hunger. Conversely, investing in these agritech companies have a far greater positive and sustainable impact than short-term solutions like food aid.     

Although food aid has saved the lives of countless millions of people across Africa, it has also been used to keep wars going while never putting in place the basic infrastructures for local production. 

Without robust local production, people on the continent are harshly affected by global events. The current war in the Ukraine, for instance, is interrupting food aid to Somalia and South Sudan, placing hundreds of thousands of people at risk of starvation.

Although food aid is still a desperately necessary and immediate solution, many international development funds are choosing to invest in agritech companies that, in turn, invest in the people they serve. It is not an overnight fix to the problems of hunger, poverty, and malnutrition, but it represents the best chance for long-term, permanent results.

For investors, positive impact has become as important as profit potential. Ventures that improve the lives of rural communities, draw investor attention. This is especially true for companies that upskill farmers with valuable training, provide running finance and access to time-saving technologies, and supply built-in markets for their produce.

Tech Investment in Africa is Increasing

As Business Insider Africa reports, Kenya is currently the “top destination for agritech investments in Africa”, driven by its agriculture-centric economy and, specifically, a need to solve their food security problem once and for all. Agritech and its ability to reach smallholders plays such an important role in Kenya’s strategy to achieve food security that the Central Bank of Kenya launched MobiGrow in 2018. With the express purpose of reaching smallholder famers, it uses a backwards-compatible USSD system to give farmers access to mobile-based bank accounts. 

Investment in the agriculture space is not just up to governments and venture capitalists. Timbuktoo, a new tech innovation financing facility by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), is set to be built in Rwanda. The announcement is stirring excitement for a technology boom on the continent. “The initiative aims to invest millions of dollars in catalytic and commercial capital over the next 10 years in order to build a distributed innovation network of eight pan-African hubs located in key ecosystems,” according to The New Times.

With specific hubs focussing on specific industry verticals, including fintech, agritech, and logistics, agrifood innovators across the continent will soon get access to more critical early-stage finance than ever before.

African solutions to first-world problems

Africa can learn from the mistakes made elsewhere. We now have better long-term data and accurate climate research, and the results are conclusive. Of the nine planetary boundaries we have crossed SIX. Agriculture and the food system has been a major contributor to all six, with climate change, a loss of biosphere/biodiversity integrity, land-systems change, the phosphorous and nitrogen cycle in the biogeochemical flow, freshwater use, and “novel entities” or chemical pollution from synthetic sources, all heavily impacted by the agrifood industry. 

The decimation that occurred in the US and EU as a result of unfettered overuse of pesticides, fertilizer, and repeated monoculture has seriously undermined the health of their soil, their pollinating insects, and biodiversity as a whole. On top of that, as FoodTank reports, the European farming system is only alive because the EU “spends roughly 60 billion Euros every year keeping its farmers in business. This massive annual subsidy is three times as much as Europe spends annually on development aid to all of Africa.”

Building on the wealth of knowledge from the mistakes of others, agripreneurs in Africa have a chance to do it better. And that is where agricultural technology companies come in. 

With locally focussed business models that address knowledge gaps and provide farmers with better training and support, agritech entrepreneurs are empowering smallholder farmers and their families. 

Going into the future all the business choices and technological strides we make must be sustainable, nature-positive, higher-yielding with far less resources, and resilient to climate catastrophes.      

In short… agritech entrepreneurs in Africa have a monumental task. If they can design solutions that empower the people on continent, eliminating poverty and hunger while advancing the health of our natural environment, it will be a model to the rest of the planet.

Food and technology have been intricately linked since the dawn of agriculture. Every tool designed to work the soil and produce food, from a simple hoe to a high-tech self-driving harvester with an integrated vegetable packaging facility, is agritech. And our reliance on more advanced agricultural technologies to feed the world will only grow.

“If you want to feed the world in 2050, then the next 40 years, we need to produce the same amount of food as we did over the last 8000 years. And that gives a bit of an indication of the pressure on the food system,” says Prof Ernst van den Ende, of Wageningen University & Research in the Netherlands. In the past, more food meant simply to add more farmland into the equation. But that is no longer an option.  

“We’ve already cleared an area roughly the size of South America to grow crops. To raise livestock, we’ve taken over even more land, an area roughly the size of Africa. Agriculture’s footprint has caused the loss of whole ecosystems around the globe […]” relates Jonathan Foley in National Geographic. With 40% of the land surface of the entire planet already converted to farmland, and a very strong possibility that overfishing will cause the irreparable collapse of the global fishing industry, the need to leverage technology and nature-positive food production practices is more urgent than ever.

Change of the current system is inevitable, and agritech will be a determining factor in the battle for a healthier planet. 

Agritech boosts production on already-farmed lands

Leapfrogging the environmental damage caused by the intensification of agriculture in developed countries, Africa has an opportunity to increase the yields on existing farmland without further destruction of natural habitat. As a recent research study on The future of farming: Who will produce our food?, notes, by combining “principles of agroecology, organic agriculture and (increasingly) regenerative agriculture” with high-precision, agricultural technologies farmers can maximise yield on less land, using fewer resources, while protecting and increasing biodiversity.

Rural Farmers Hub, one of the winners of Pitch AgriHack in 2021, helps farmers in Nigeria to understand their soil and maximise their yields. They consolidate agronomic data, including climate and satellite data, to generate personalised recommendations for their farmers that guide them to improved soil and crop health. Their data-driven agritech service helps farmers to make optimal farming decision, leading to yield increases of up to 55%.  

Agritech increases efficiency with less resources

A major deterrent keeping many rural young people from participating in agriculture is the time-intensive and labour-intensive nature of legacy agriculture practises. In short, the more time and resources it takes to complete farming processes, like planting and harvest, the less profit you make for every hour you spend working. 

Ghanaian agricultural equipment manufacturer SAYeTECH, saw the impact of manual farm labour on school children who were kept out of class during harvest season to help their families with the threshing of their crops. It inspired them to design a multi-crop thresher that knocks cereals off their stalks. It may seem like a simple task but threshing a one-acre harvest takes two weeks of manual labour. With a SAYeTECH automated thresher, the task is completed in less than two hours. 

Although this example is about human resources, agritech has the potential to reduce the resources used at every step of the farming process. Drip irrigation wastes far less water. Data-driven precision fertiliser and pesticide application reduces the amount of chemicals damaging the environment. And share-economy technology, like AYuTe Winner Hello Tractor, means farm equipment can benefit entire communities instead of just single owners.  

Agricultural technologies can make time-consuming processes effortless, giving farmers more time to diversify or streamline their farming operations. And, more importantly, it gives their children time to focus on their own education, growing a capable generation of future farmers who are serious about protecting the environment.

Agritech minimises food waste

Food waste is one of the biggest barriers to feeding the planet. In Foley’s five step plan to feed 9 billion people he says, “An estimated 25 percent of the world’s food calories and up to 50 percent of total food weight are lost or wasted before they can be consumed.” Fixing this one problem will have the single biggest impact on food availability. 

Across Africa, post-harvest losses are a massive problem. Poor infrastructure like damaged roads, lack of transport, and few cold storage solutions to keep food fresh in the sweltering heat, means yields are lost before they even reach the marketplace. 

Pitch AgriHack winner Fresh-in-a-Box in Zimbabwe overcomes this specific problem by rethinking the logistics of traditional agriculture. They ask, why can’t fresh food simply go straight from the farm to the consumer? Through their e-commerce platform and direct delivery service, they offer farmers and consumers a waste-free solution, with guaranteed freshness and no middlemen to inflate the prices.      

Agritech overcomes finance barriers

Finance and investment for agricultural endeavours is a sensitive topic, especially for smallholders. Finance institutions require farmers to provide collateral for loans, and interest rates are often too high for agricultural operations that have a long-term profit horizon. Digital financing and investment platforms, designed specifically with farmers in mind, are reducing this barrier-to-entry fast.

FarmCrowdy in Nigeria and GrowAgric in Kenya, both previous Pitch AgriHack winners, are platforms that provide an end-to-end value chain service to secure their investment in small farms. But they don’t just give farmers money to get their operations going. They also provide training on best practises, supply quality inputs to help their farmers increase yields, and guarantee a market for the crops. To protect against a worst-case scenario, they also provide insurance on the harvest. 

Holistic value-chain services that leverage agritech helps to maximise yields on existing farmland, and by empowering smallholders to make real profits from their hard work, they increase the prosperity of rural communities. Transferring the latest best-practises in nature-positive food production is helping these farmers to be better stewards of their environment.

Do you have climate-smart agritech solution that will help to build a better food system and a healthier planet? Then Pitch AgriHack 2022 is for you! African founders or co-founders, aged 18-40, of technology-based and digital services businesses in the agriculture sector are eligible to enter. Applications for Pitch AgriHack are open from 20 June 2022 to 29 July 2022 at https://genafrica.org/pitchagrihack.