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SPEKE FARMS
Speke Farms: Online platform bringing farmers to market, extensions, and investments.
Today a major part of internet consumption is increasing not only in town but also in rural areas. People have access to small phone or smart phone even computer . The demand and supply of commodities are possible through internet especially in agriculture sector. Farmers need access to agricultural input, market for their products, investment as well as learning good agricultural practice. Unemployed youth ,women need access to jobs so that the unemployment rate would decrease especially in creating their own or delivering commodities from place to place.
The solution is Speke E-farming Solutions, a global online platform which provide market for agricultural inputs and outputs , supplying crops to consumers , learning through extension and entrepreneurship as well as providing network for farmers to investors in agricultural sector.
If it scared globally, it would cut cost between distribution, wholesaler, and retailers of agricultural inputs/outputs as well as provision of knowledge and networking to investment.
Speke Farms target farmers especially youth, women and disabled people who need access to good market for their inputs and their output(produce), knowledge which are needed to transform agriculture into profitable business as well as connecting them to investors for better accessing to finance . We will sell the harvests of farmers to consumers to reduce the gap in supply chain.
Our platform will be composed of four main components
- Selling of agriculture inputs such as fertilizers ,pesticides ,seeds etc. to farmers as well as selling of crops to consumers.
- Buying of agriculture outputs where farmers will sell their produce on our online platform
- E-learning part where farmers and other people who are interested in farming activities will get access to lessons on good agriculture practice as well as business and leadership skills that are needed to turn agriculture into profitable business
- Investment consultation part where farmers will get full information about all opportunities available for their business to increase their chance for development such as training, investment ,grants and other service
Define three specific objectives that you would like to achieve with your proposal.
According to Food and Agriculture Organization of United Nation “ Africa’s population are projected to more than double by the middle in 2050 and GDP per capita on the continent expected to continue raising”(FAO,2017). This will put pressure to farmers because food will be required to increase to be afford the arising population. Estimate of food consumption will continue to increase more than 100% to be enough in feeding population.
We connect farmers to market and customers for their inputs and outputs/supplying crops to consumers ,equipping them with knowledge for good agriculture practice for feeding the arising population as well as connecting them to investors to reduce the problem of capital in agribusiness sectors by helping farmers access to finance.
We reduce poverty, unemployment and boosting income of smallholder and other farmers by cutting the cost between farmers ,distributors, wholesaler and retailers of Agri-inputs and outputs.
We equip farmers with skills necessary to turn agriculture practice in profitable business through extension(online training through our platform and offline training) with interest in women, unemployed youth as well as disabled people.
What problems (particularly in value chain competitiveness and global disruption) are your community’s stakeholders facing due to the Covid-19 pandemic?
Community’s stakeholders met the problem of unexpected price fluctuation of crops and inputs where farmers lack market and means of marketing of their own products due to pandemic outbreak of Covid-19 because of movement restriction in some part of the country
.Most farmers face the problem of having low capital and inability to attract any grants because as small holder farmers are unnoticed in the eyes of donors and banks consider them as people who are not bankable, uneducated so that to get loan become more challenging.
Farmers have the barriers of ignorance in using technology for good agriculture practice because they are not familiar with their benefits and they lack technical know how about making agriculture into profitable business venture
Lack of access to enough finance; farmers are lacking sufficient amount of money to develop the implementation of commercial-oriented farming which is very helpful to farmers boosting their yields and increase their income resulting to higher living standard of life shifting from living under $ 2 to more than $ 5 as their income per day.
What minimum viable solution(s) are you proposing to address the challenge(s) in your community?
Training farmers about how to use internet and other payment service that are necessary to implement e-commerce and other related service with provision of technical support. We will request advocacy from government agencies in finding out markets for produce both nationally and international in order to help our farmers to gain income. We will also build strong good partnership with microfinance, government agencies to help farmers to get both capital(loan)/grants and other assistances. We also planned to show aptitude and impacts of our innovation as strategies of finding funds from other stakeholders
Share your story (your narrative)
When I started my bachelor’s degree in Conservation agriculture, I used to ask myself why farmers are poor while they work hard to serve our life. I visited different part of my country to find the problems that farmers face and I have observed that in developing countries including Rwanda there are more than 200 million small holder farmers and other farmers who live under $2/day (World Bank,2019). Most farmers are poor because they lack access to good market for their produce as well as market of agricultural inputs and this cause loss of harvests which is called post-harvest losses. Some of them get market from local distributors who gave them small amount of money that are less than their investment. Those buyers get profit in only distribution while farmers get loss while there were the one who struggled with growing crop and taking care of them from seedling to harvests! Farmers lack learning and skills that are needed to do good agriculture practice that will be turned into profit, the reason why they got poor quality of harvest. This put agricultural sector neglected by investors and youth so many of them still become unemployed. Speke Farms seeks to increase connection between farmers to market for their inputs and outputs/supplying food to consumers, equipping them with knowledge for good agriculture practice as well as connecting them to investors to reduce the problem of capital in agribusiness sectors by helping farmers access to finance. This will help them to turn agriculture into profitable business venture to eradicate poverty.
Please provide any additional relevant information that you would like to share.
- 1. Innovation of our platform
Our innovative platform has the potential of being the right one that others in addressing the challenges of farmers, women, disabled people to reduce poverty through providing market for agricultural inputs and outputs , supplying crops to consumers , learning through extension and entrepreneurship as well as providing network for farmers to investors in agricultural sector.
Our solution will provide the inter-connection between with farmers, women, unemployed youth and disabled people in agribusiness sectors with supermarkets, Agri-processing industries, consumers, Agri-input industries, truck drivers, local deliverers, government agencies ,financial institutions, private investors, higher learning institution(land-grant institutions) and other stakeholders. This will create huge number of employment opportunities than other business in generating multiple income to all stakeholders especially those who were neglected in getting funds for their agribusiness venture
- 2. Our core technology
Speke Farms platform will build and rely on software technology where it composed the e-commerce services, education services and provision of opportunities through connection with investors. It will have social media service for provision of update about all information needed by stakeholders. The stakeholders will also be able to use mobile phones for paying or receiving their money as well as using ATM cards. We will take advantage of Artificial Intelligence to provide users with the most relevant opportunities for success rate. We will use voice-controlled virtual assistants to help our farmers to make better experience of their learning. We will have mobile application that will increase our interaction with our stakeholders to fulfill the services that would be needed in any time
- 3. Working capabilities of our technology
The proposed technologies are widely used and accepted technology across the world because e-commerce have become one of the main sales and purchase channel for our target since they have smart phone, banking system, and telephone network allowed users to save their money and withdraw them. Mobile application in another hand have proved to increase user’s interaction over long period of time
- 4. Our theory of change
Connecting farmers, women, unemployed youth and disabled people in agribusiness sectors with supermarkets, Agri-processing industries, consumers, Agri-input industries, truck drivers, local deliverers, government agencies ,financial institutions, private investors, higher learning institution(land-grant institutions) and other stakeholders will increase demand and supply chain of agriculture inputs and outputs, increasing knowledge sharing and investment in agricultural sectors. It will allow us to create more job opportunities especially for women, unemployed youth and disabled people. If we can create jobs for disadvantageous people, there is no doubt that we can increase their quality of life and unlock the potential of most downgraded population group in the globe.
- 5. Our next year and five-year goals
- i. Our 1-year goals are the following
Having designed platform secured with only selling and buying components and launching our service and e-commerce in English, Kinyarwanda, French and Kiswahili language to reach maximum people with technology
Finding and intensification of partnership with farmers, women, unemployed youth and disabled people in agribusiness sectors with supermarkets, Agri-processing industries, consumers, Agri-input industries, truck drivers, local deliverers, government agencies ,financial institutions, private investors, higher learning institution(land-grant institutions) and other stakeholders to help us to start our business venture.
Addition of Investment and Learning component of platform with contents for users and mentors.
Growing to impact 20,000 users on our platform.
- ii. Five years goals are the following
Creating huge number of employment opportunities in generating multiple income to all stakeholders especially those who were neglected in getting funds for their agribusiness venture across Africa and other continents.
Expanding our service to more than 1000,000 beneficiaries and stakeholders across Africa, China ,England ,Holland and USA
I suggest you partner with some logistics company since the agricultural produce needs to be shipped at discounted or predecided prices to make profits and not lose all of it on shipping and handling.
In addition, what about the agricultural produce storage facilities? The produce must remain fresh to gain profits, how are you going to ensure that the consumers don't get rotten goods or scammed?
Not sure if Glovo is available in your country, they are very active in Kenya and they have created excellent partnerships. There are also logistics centric tech applications like Sendy in Kenya which make the delivery logistics way easier
Hi Jean Claude,
I trust you are well.
Let me congratulate you on your idea which to me is an all-round great idea which needs developed and piloted as soon as possible.
I wish to share a question and a remark for your consideration.
1. It would be great to know more about your how do you plan to monetize your platform – business model – in the minimum viable solution section.
2. Consider updating the problem section to reflect on the challenges experienced in by farmers and the entire value chain as a result of COVID-19. These challenges must favour your platform as a viable solution.
3. Consider changing your objectives into SMART objectives to reflect how you intend to convert your idea to a prototype in the years to come. Visit https://thedigitalprojectmanager.com/project-objectives/ for a detailed explanation
Great idea with the farmers in mind
Well-done Speke. I am impressed on your agric virtual marketplace project. I think Kitovu project on Kitovu.com.ng could be helpful.
Also, using escrow on your platform will ensure safe transactions. Best of luck.
Partnership, Branding and digital marketing is very important for your business. You can work on that as you have next 5 years work plan.
Great idea.
How to you tend to keep perishable goods or how is it going to be handled ?
Kindly review my idea and vote please..I will be honored to hear your comments.
Users tagged:
Hello Jean Claude, I had already commented and voted. Kindly review what Glovo and Twiga Foods are doing in Kenya and you could benefit from some of their ideas. All the best
Hi Jean
Good initiative. In your five years goals, be specific on the number of employment opportunities, that you're going to create rather than using the word " huge". It will make sense when measuring the success of your initiative. Add some statistics, on how your target audience( farmers) lack knowledge on technology, on how to make agribusiness profitable. How many lack access to finances.
The buying and selling of farm input or output from farmers, does it go through Speke Farm or is it going to be a peer to peer transactions?
I suggest you also work towards organizing annual investors conference for farmers.