Nigerian wins $50,000 Africa agripreneur award

A Nigerian and another agripreneur clinched top honours at the fifth annual GoGettaz Agripreneur Prize Competition Finals held at the Africa Food Systems Forum Summit 2023 in Tanzania. The event held on Friday.

During a youth town hall event chaired by President Samia Hassan of Tanzania, Generation Africa awarded two grand prizes of $50,000 to Hasina Andriatsitohaina, founder and CEO of Mad’Arom in Madagascar, and Ikenna Nzewi, co-founder and CEO of Releaf Africa in Nigeria.

There were four other winners who received US$2,500 each. Generation Africa partner USAID donated a further US$1,000 to each of the remaining six finalists.

“This year’s summit theme is ‘Recover, Regenerate, Act: Africa’s Solutions to Food Systems Transformation.’ Far from being a distant hope, these GoGettaz have demonstrated to everyone at the Summit that they are Africa’s solutions,” said Agnes Kalibata, president of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA).

“I hope the investors were paying attention because I can clearly see how some of these businesses have the potential to impact millions of lives across the continent in the next decade.”

Grand prize

The grand prize in the female category went to a food technology specialist engineer in agriculture and environmental sciences, Hasina Andriatsitohaina of Madagascar.

Hasina’s company, Mad’Arom encourages the development of the spice and aroma value chains by promoting the agroforestry system with around 2,000 producers in rural areas of Madagascar, and by collecting and transforming the products into essential oils before wholesaling it to the food, cosmetics, and perfume industries on the national and international markets.

In the male category, the grand prize went to Nigeria’s Mr Nzewi whose Releaf’s value proposition is lowering food costs through efficiency, which it achieves with both software and hardware solutions.

To process the palm nuts in a sustainable and environmentally sensitive way, Releaf designed the palm nut de-sheller, named “Kraken”. So far, Releaf has worked with 5,600 farmers with a retention rate of 86% and put an additional $500,000 in their pockets while eliminating child labor, providing access to finance, and improving traceability using artificial intelligence. Releaf plans to add 20,000 more farmers in the next five years.

Full list of the 2023 GoGettaz Agripreneur Prize winners

Female Agripreneurs

1. Jannifer Muthike, Dudu Masters Limited, Kenya

Dudu Masters in Kenya is on a mission to restore Africa’s degraded farmland with its soil-enhancing Kijanni VermiCompost, a sustainable and affordable fertiliser bio-converted by insects from the organic waste of hotels and schools. Dudu Masters is sharing its skills and expertise by training 5,000 students in regenerative agriculture and insect farming.

2. Patience Ben, Farmavi Agro, Nigeria

Farmavi Agro in Nigeria brings social impact and agriculture together with a range of products that upcycle sawdust, cassava waste, and seaweed into food and fertilizers. Its goal is to reduce waste, tackle poverty and malnutrition, create employment opportunities (especially for women), and mitigate climate change.

3. Hasina Andriatsitohaina, Mad’Arom, Madagascar

Madagascar is rich in biodiversity, including aromatic and therapeutic plants, a signature of Madagascar on the international market due to their authenticity. The development of these spice and herb value chains is one of the main pillars of development in Madagascar’s rural areas. The income generated by the sale of these products by Mad’Arom enables poor households to meet their food and health needs year-round and send their children to school.

4. Patrice Wachira, Patvention Recycling Enterprise, Kenya

Patvention Recycling Enterprise in Kenya transforms plastic waste into durable, weather-resistant, and pest-resistant beehives. Its capacity-building initiatives and training workshops are introducing new farmers, especially women, to beekeeping and improving beekeeping practices.

5. Margaret Wanjiku, Pollen Patrollers, Kenya

Pollen Patrollers is making beekeeping in Kenya smarter with an IoT device that measures temperature, humidity, sound, foraging activity, and queen status. It uses AI and machine learning to analyse the data to create actionable insights and precision pollination maps for beekeepers and growers.

6. Crescentia Mushobozi, Tanzania Vijana Agribusiness Enterprises, Tanzania

Tanzania Vijana Agribusiness Enterprises (a.k.a. VIABLE) believes its superior potato strain, engineered in collaboration with Africa’s largest gene bank, is a key piece in solving malnutrition and the potato shortage in Africa. Its first 1,000 disease-free potato seeds yielded a 5-tonne harvest in six months. This youth-led enterprise is ready to scale.

Male Agripreneurs

1. Pelkins Ajanoh, CassVita, Cameroon

CassVita believes climate resilient cassava root is the key to food security in the face of climate change in Africa. Its post-harvest processing techniques extends the shelf-life of cassava from 3 days to 18 months, helping rural farmers in Cameroon get real value from their crops.

2. Tafadzwa Ron Chikwereti, eAgro, Zimbabwe

eAgro takes the guesswork out of farming in Zimbabwe by bundling complex technologies into a user-friendly WhatsApp chatbot. Their CropFix A.I. chatbot uses photos from a farmer’s mobile phone to diagnose pests and diseases and provide relevant, location-based agronomic advice in seconds.

3. Martin Dainbaquee, Eco-friendly Incubator Company, Sierra Leone

The Eco-Friendly Rechargeable Incubator and Local Animal Feed Processing Company has a name that says it all. It is reinventing the ailing import-dependent egg and poultry industry in Sierra Leone with locally manufactured high-capacity incubators, its own specialised chicken breeds, and a consistent supply of high quality feed.

4. Imani Bora, Hatch Plus, Rwanda

Hatch Plus in Rwanda provides automated solar hatching stations as a service, where it uses AI and computer vision to track egg fertility. Its deep learning software, Agroid, delivers poultry farming advice via SMS, giving smallholders access to affordable, healthy chicks, and real-time assistance to thrive.

5. Ikenna Nzewi, Releaf Africa, Nigeria

Releaf in Nigeria is taking a holistic approach to eliminate inefficiency in the food value chain. They use their geospatial software, SITE, to find farms, their SALT software to buy crops from farmers, and Kraken, the most advanced palm nut de-shelling technology, to produce vegetable oil that is sold to food factories.

6. Yohan Gallet, Sealife Organics, Mauritius

Sealife Organics in Mauritius hopes to repair its soil and sea from the damaging effects of rampant chemical fertilizers use, and is turning to the ocean for answers. Sealife Organics produces organic fertilisers that don’t poison the environment using sustainably sourced seaweed and organic waste.