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“The lack of an access to a structured market results in smallholder farmers being forced to sell to middlemen who buy at ridiculously exploitative prices,” writes the team at AgroCenta, a mobile marketplace for Ghanaian farmers, on its website. Ghanaian farmers don’t have access to buyers in faraway cities, or access to truckers who can transport their goods to a central market. The middlemen provide a service, but it hardly benefits the farmers at all. The middlemen have all the power, and with a largely illiterate population of farmers, all the leverage. AgroCenta, founded by two former employees of Esoko, a financial assistance app, is a sort of Swiss Army knife of tools to help address those issues. It’s not cutting out the middlemen, not yet, but it places some more power in the hands of farmers, with the goal of increasing that power. Within that knife are four platforms: AgroTrade, AgroPay, Truckr, and AgroInfo.

AgroCenta is an innovative online platform that empowers small holder farmers and farmer based organizations in rural farming communities access a wider online market outside their immediate locality to trade fairly and equitably. They can access technological tools and information that will inform them on best farming practices such weather information, market information and finally access to agro inputs such as fertilizers, pesticides and weedicides directly from stakeholders.

AgroCenta is an innovative online platform that empowers small holder farmers and farmer based organizations in rural farming communities access a wider online market outside their immediate locality to trade fairly and equitably. They can access technological tools and information that will inform them on best farming practices such weather information, market information and finally access to agro inputs such as fertilizers, pesticides and weedicides directly from stakeholders.

AgroCenta is an innovative online platform that empowers small holder farmers and farmer based organizations in rural farming communities access a wider online market outside their immediate locality to trade fairly and equitably. They can access technological tools and information that will inform them on best farming practices such weather information, market information and finally access to agro inputs such as fertilizers, pesticides and weedicides directly from stakeholders.

Pula says it provides farmers with insurance bundled with inputs (such as seeds and fertiliser) and farmer advisory services to help increase their yields and boost (and protect) their income. “In our five years since launching, we’ve built strong traction for our products. However, the fact remains that across Africa and other emerging markets, there are still millions of smallholder farmers with risks to their livelihoods that have not been covered,” says Goslinga. Insurance is unpopular in Africa, with the continent’s insurance penetration estimated to be 2.8% in 2017. Insurance penetration is particularly low in the agricultural sector, and convincing farmers to buy insurance during favourable seasons is difficult.

The Insurtech award which targets non-insurers collaborating with insurers to improve customer service delivery, product development and innovation was organised by the African Reinsurance Corporation (Africa Re). The company was recognised for successfully managing over 4.3 million smallholder farmers through their Area Yield Index Insurance product. It provides insurance services and digital solutions to farmers in 12 countries in Africa, with Nigeria being the leading market for Pula.

AgroCenta was recently selected by Seedstars World for its Seedstars Growth Program. Seedstars Growth Program offers high growth startups $50,000 with access to business advisory and marketing services on top.

The company has got some investors like Greentech Capital Partners, Isebaltic Trust, World Trade Organisation and SANAD Technical Facility in Jordan among others. Currently, the startup has an ongoing agreement with various companies that include Guinness Ghana Breweries and is hoping to bring Nestle Ghana on board within 2018.

FarmDrive has also partnered with the ACP-EU Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Co-operation (CTA) to build the capacity of Kenyan young farmers and stakeholders and help them access finance.

Farm Drive has a wide variety of partners including: investors (Engineers without Borders and Mercy Corps); capacity building (Open Capital advisors, ACRE Africa -to create insurance products); and financial institutions (Musoni Kenya).

FarmDrive catalyzes financial institutions to lend more to smallholder farmers by de-risking the process through clear and transparent records. Farmer clients of FarmDrive are benefiting from financial awareness, financial management tools, farming-related recommendations, access to finance and links to profitable markets.

AgroTrade makes managing pre-harvest and post harvest activities a breeze. It is effortless monitoring farmers activities right from planting till when commodities get to the warehouses of off-takers.

AgroCenta was founded by two ex-esoko employees, Francis Obirikorang and Michael K. Ocansey in 2015 to improve the agricultural value chain in Ghana. Two critical problems within the value chain, which are the lack of an access to market for smallholder farmers in the rural areas, which subjected them to activities of exploitative, buying frommiddlemen and the lack of a coordinated truck delivery system to cart their commodities from farms to markets to sell.

However, PULA’s research showed that registration was not as simple in practice. Because customers had to go through several steps on their phones, they found the registration process to be cumbersome. More importantly, research showed that customers wanted more than simplicity. Most agents and smallholders hesitated to sign up for the insurance after simply reading about it. And input agents, who are often trusted, face-to-face sources of information, did not make enough of an effort to explain the product. PULA often told agents that, by informing customers that their input purchases were insured, they were likely to increase sales, but this proved to be an inadequate incentive.

Pula is at the center of an ecosystem that provides insurance to smallholder farmers and has amassed 50 insurance partners and six reinsurance partners. Its clientele includes the likes of the World Food Programme and Central Bank of Nigeria, as well as the Zambian and Kenyan governments among others.

Ghanaian agritech startup Agrocenta will use its recently closed $650 000 round to expand operations in Ghana — the company’s CEO and co-founder Francis Obirikorang revealed yesterday.

Ghanaian agritech startup Agrocenta will use its recently closed $650 000 round to expand operations in Ghana — the company’s CEO and co-founder Francis Obirikorang revealed yesterday.

Agrocenta, a Ghanaian agritech startup has won a $500,000 investment for coming first globally at the just concluded 2018 Seedstars Global competition in Lausanne, Switerland. The final leg of Seedstars World early-stage pitching competition took place on Thursday with 21 African startups among the 65 finalists competing in Switzerland. At the live final pitching showdown, 12 shortlisted startups went head-to-head, with Agrocenta eventually being crowned the overall global winner of the contest, taking home a $500,000 investment from Seedstars World.

Through AgroCenta’s CropChain platform, smallholder farmers can execute transactions with accurate information and provide reliable access to financing, inputs and knowledge on agricultural best practices. AgroCenta has increased crop yields of farmers by 40% and increased the average CropChain farmer’s income by 35%.

FarmDrive, a Kenyan enterprise, connects unbanked and underserved smallholder farmers to credit, while helping financial institutions cost-effectively increase their agricultural loan portfolios.