Integrated Agro Industrial Parks – Ethiopia Agropower
From UNIDO:
Mentalgator aggregates blogs and websites that I read regularly
by Emeka Okafor
by Emeka Okafor
Elgon Kenya and the University of Nairobi have signed a Memorandum of Understanding paving way for the construction of the Agricultural Technology and Innovation Centre (ATIC) at the College of Agriculture and Veterinary Services, Upper Kabete Campus in the capital city.
The ATIC will nurture and strengthen innovations in agriculture and entrepreneurship. The aim is to foster adoption of cutting edge innovations leading to job creation and product development resulting in a thriving agricultural sector for enhanced economic growth for the country. World over, agriculture technology incubation centres are becoming instrumental in translating scientific discoveries into products for economic development. “The venture is born out of the need to foster a culture of innovation, promote resource mobilization for development and commercialization of market-demanded products and services. At the same time, it will train and mentor innovators and entrepreneurs in order to increase chances of commercial success and to accelerate uptake of technology along the agricultural value chains,” said Prof Stephen Kiama, Vice Chancellor, and University of Nairobi...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
Small and medium agribusiness and agtech (agricultural technology) start-ups often struggle to grow due to a lack of access to resources, appropriate technologies, technical and management expertise, and market support.
CGIAR researchers at ICRISAT in 2003 founded the Agri-Business Incubator (ABI-ICRISAT) program to address these challenges. By leveraging research expertise and aggregating the services of various actors in the agricultural sector, ABI-ICRISAT has managed to provide many innovative solutions to value-chain problems commonly faced by start-ups...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
Kenya has the highest penetration of off-grid solar systems in Africa. Farmers in the region are gaining access to a number of solar-powered devices, including irrigation pumps, egg incubators, grain processors, and refrigerators...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
The Milken-Motsepe Innovation Prize program is a series of multi-year, multimillion-dollar prize competitions for technological solutions that accelerate progress towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), with a spotlight on Africa
by Emeka Okafor
Kenya, Nigeria and Eswatini are taking the lead on genome editing in Africa as they see its potential in boosting food security and increasing farmers’ incomes. To aid this advance, the three African nations have made significant progress in establishing guidelines to regulate gene editing and gene drive, whereas other countries are taking the direction of case-by-case regulation...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
...Cameroon farmer Rostand Simeu, 26, last year spent all his savings to start a plantain and banana plantation. But, like all new farmers, he has struggled with efficient production. Simeu said the bananas have been growing for 13 months. He said this raises a lot of questions. Simeu heard about a Cameroonian company that helps farmers in remote areas to analyze their soil quality and to help choose crops. Technology startup Clinic Agro created a kit with a mobile application called Clinic Sol for instant soil testing. Founder Pyrrus Koudjou said he invented the kit to help farmers who were losing money...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
The African Union (AU) and Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) have been pushing for investment in agriculture and increased food production. At a webinar, experts in agribusiness incubators and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) showed the way to go...[more]Related video:
by Emeka Okafor
by Emeka Okafor
Innovation continues to remain the key to unlocking the wealth of nations and it can be explored through various sectors of the economy. One such sector that has seen a massive innovation drive has been the agriculture space...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
Through its African Food Fund, specialist investment manager Silk Invest has invested in a Nigerian restaurant business, a confectionery producer operating out of Cairo and an Ethiopia-based biscuit manufacturer. Betsy G. Henderson speaks to Silk Invest founder and CEO Zin Bekkali about opportunities in Africa’s food industry...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
by Emeka Okafor
In the process of trying to determine if I could trust the founders’ approach, I interviewed Anuradha Mittal, the executive director of The Oakland Institute. Mittal is not involved with the company and was willing to provide an outside perspective based on her years of expertise in development, human rights, and farming.
I asked her for her thoughts on this one company selling one grain, and I was genuinely (and pleasantly) surprised by her enthusiasm. I also loved this interview. It gets at so many complex issues with the global food supply chain in just a few questions. Mittal links building food processing infrastructure in Africa to efforts to dismantle a history of colonization and says we should be looking to traditional crops to figure out how to feed ourselves as the climate changes.
I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
More here
Dr Nakalembe, an assistant professor at the University of Maryland's geographical sciences department in the US, uses the satellite data to study agriculture and weather patterns.
That information is combined with data gathered on the ground about the crops and their condition to build a model that learns to recognise patterns to help make predictions.
It was this that won her the 2020 Africa Food Prize alongside Burkina Faso's Dr André Bationo for his work on fertiliser.
The scientist, who also heads the Africa section of Nasa's food and agriculture programme, explains: "From the air, you can see which area is built-up, bare, has vegetation or water.
"We are also able to tell what is cropland or what is forest. Because we have a 30-year record of what cropland looks like, we can tell what is healthy, what isn't or which part has improved."
by Emeka Okafor
Foodlocker offers procurement efficiency, affordability, convenience, and pricing regularity to diverse buyers of farm-fresh foodstuff and grocery items by aggregating the outputs of smallholder farmers and fast-moving consumer goods companies and selling them directly to our customers via our unique omni-channel retail operations. Our vision is to become the one-stop shop for farm-fresh foodstuff and grocery items in Africa that addresses the logistical and infrastructural gaps in the food value chain across Africa.
by Emeka Okafor
Twenty-five young African agripreneurs have advanced to the “boot camp” final round of the African Development Bank’s AgriPitch competition, stepping closer to a share of $120,000 in seed funding prizes, training and other benefits.
The final round offers young entrepreneurs in Africa’s agricultural sector the opportunity to pitch their agribusiness proposals online to a panel of experts and investors who will select the winners...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
The agriculture industry has radically transformed over the past 50 years. Advances in machinery have expanded the scale, speed, and productivity of farm equipment, leading to more efficient cultivation of more land. Seed, irrigation, and fertilizers also have vastly improved, helping farmers increase yields. Now, agriculture is in the early days of yet another revolution, at the heart of which lie data and connectivity. Artificial intelligence, analytics, connected sensors, and other emerging technologies could further increase yields, improve the efficiency of water and other inputs, and build sustainability and resilience across crop cultivation and animal husbandry...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
a growing movement is seeking to provide farmers, small businesses, and restaurants with affordable, solar-powered fridges and other alternatives that can drastically reduce food waste, improve profit margins, protect the environment, and combat hunger.
Here are five companies that are ending food waste in Africa and beyond with pioneering technologies...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
by Emeka Okafor
The US continues to dominate investment in agritech innovation. According to AgFunder research, US startups netted $8.7 billion in funding across 683 deals last year.
That’s just over a third of all 1,858 agrifoodtech venture deals worldwide – and closer to half of of total global funding in dollar terms, at $19.8 billion.
But China isn’t far behind – and, as the consumer digital revolution that has gripped the country in the past decade moves up the supply chain to the farm gate, it’s only going to close the gap with the US farther. That’s the view of Matilda Ho, founder and managing director of Shanghai-based VC firm Bits x Bites...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
A host of crowd farming platforms have sprung up across the continent in recent years, connecting smallholders with much-needed investment. Globally, the financial sector meets less than 3% of total smallholder demand for financing, but crowd farming is starting to reduce the deficit on a continent where 60% of the world’s uncultivated arable land lies dormant. Africa has among the lowest agricultural yields in the world, making it ripe for positive disruption through technology...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
“We are at the start of an agrifood tech revolution in Africa and many legacy business models will be disrupted over time.”
So says Gerhard Visagie, co-founder of AgVentures, a South African investment company which backs early-stage tech-enabled businesses with the potential to transform Africa’s agriculture and food industry. AgVentures recently raised an anchor investment of R100 million (about $5.4 million) from Acorn Agri & Food and also announced its first investment...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
by Emeka Okafor
The marama bean, endemic mostly to the Kalahari Desert region, is known to scientists as one of among numerous “orphan legumes” on the African continent, a description that references the dearth of genomic—or plant family—information known about it. Researchers like Chris Cullis and his team are changing that as they dig deeper into understanding its molecular structure and learn more about how it thrives in water-scarce regions.
by Emeka Okafor
Meet Zilla Mary Arach, Co-Founder and CEO of EzyAgric, a Uganda-based startup that empowers local farmers and the entire agriculture industry with software technology that creates a one-stop center for all data, sales, and performance metrics.
by Emeka Okafor
Training scientists in advanced plant genomics is set to transform nutrition in Africa. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations works with the African Orphan Crops Consortium to assist its member countries.
The African Orphan Crops Consortium is an African-led, international consortium founded in 2011 with the goal of sequencing, assembling and annotating 101 African orphan crops. The Consortium was approved by African heads of state at the African Union Assembly and is led by the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD)...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
by Emeka Okafor
At a time where the world needs to produce more with fewer resources, artificial intelligence (AI) could help to transform agriculture worldwide...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
AgriLab is an Agritech Ideation Workshop and Bootcamp for Young Start-ups and is focused on enabling AgriTech Entrepreneurs to succeed. AgriLab aims to enable young Nigerians to turn their start-up ideas into full-fledged business models ready for investment.
by Emeka Okafor
Wandie Kazeem interviewing Peter Njonjo, CEO of Twiga Foods. An innovative company providing farmers and retail vendors access to market through their digital platform. Their supply chain helps smallholder farmers maximize market opportunities and reduce post-harvest loss by linking farmers to retail vendors...[more]
by Emeka Okafor
...The drones flying in Mozambique are part of an agri-tech initiative called ThirdEye. They carry an infrared camera that can map crop stress, which helps identify early problems caused by pests, weeds, a lack of water or a lack of fertiliser.In Niger
“Because infrared reflection changes according to how crops are performing, we’re able to detect problems 10 days before they’re noticed with the naked eye,” says Martijn de Klerk, project manager at FutureWater, the Dutch organisation behind ThirdEye. “This allows the farmer to take protective measures,” he adds.
FutureWater launched ThirdEye in 2014, with backing from USAID. Since then, the service has helped smallholder farmers increase yield by 20 per cent and water productivity by 55 per cent, says De Klerk.
...Mobile phones are also a valuable source of agri-tech for smallholder farmers. Niger’s Tele-Irrigation tool allows farmers to control crop irrigation by simply dialling a number into their mobile phones. “Over 200 farmers are using our technology, and some have since increased their areas by three, even four times and accumulated significant income,” says founder Abdou Maman Kané.More here