Kenya’s horticultural farmers are being trained in good agricultural practices. History has shown us the social and economic transformation that is possible when people can grow enough food. It has also confirmed that when the same people access markets to sell excess produce, generations will feel and enjoy the impacts. Thus, the ability to improve livelihoods is what makes agriculture a business and not just a development initiative. A group of Kenyan farmers are now demonstrating this by financially supporting their local community health centre.  Farmers from Kangai Horticulture Marketing Co-operative Society in Kirinyaga County, in the central region of Kenya, built a maternity wing and a laboratory in their local health centre with proceeds from the sale of string beans and baby corn. The enterprising group struck a deal with exporters, that for every kilo of produce sold, a shilling is invested in the hospital project. Currently, the health centre attends to 150 to 200 patients daily. “We receive services we couldn’t receive before, such as TB (tuberculosis) and CCC (Comprehensive Care Centre) for HIV and AIDS patients,” explains Mary Wambui, a technical adviser with a local fresh producer organisation, adding that the number of staff in the health centre has grown from 4 to 22. The hospital extension is Peter Kanyuiro Ngigi’s proud legacy, together with his Fresh Producers Association of Kenya (FPEAK) certificate. This certificate, he explains, has been the key to his ability to access international markets, a market that has in many occasions locked out...

If you wanted to transform 1,500 families in Tanzania, where would you start? How about with a cup of chocolate? By helping cocoa farmers in Tanzania access the market profitably, TMA’s Challenge Fund, beneficiary Kokoa Kamili is transforming their lives for the long term. 65 year old David Sanga lives in Mbingu Village in the Kilombero District of Tanzania and has grown cocoa for over ten years. Before every bean reaches the market, David must ensure that he has the right seedlings, that the trees are pruned, weeding done, the soil fertilised and the crop is free from pests for him to harvest a good crop. The crop should be delivered to collection centres which are set up for aggregation to ensure efficient access to markets. The buyers must offer him a competitive price for his cocoa beans for the practice to support his family. Thus, before the hot chocolate lands in your cup, there is a complex behind the scenes infrastructure that makes it possible. Kokoa Kamili is ensuring these behind the scenes activities benefit the farmers. Kokoa Kamili begun their project in Bingu in September 2014 after establishing that few cocoa buyers meant that local cocoa beans fetched poor prices comparative to other areas. The prices set by out-growers’ associations were also predetermined and non-negotiable. Transport costs to the collection points meant a further dip in farmers' profits. Poor seedlings affected the amount of produce down the line. Kokoa Kamili's mixed approach offers free collection services for wet...

It’s a long way from Makerere University in Uganda’s capital Kampala to the rural district of Yumbe, in the north-west of the country, bordering South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Approximately 600 KM. The two places are also separated by climate, topography and, significantly, socio-economic status. It’s fitting then, that they are drawn together by an exciting new enterprise started by Makerere academics, which they hope will bring income and employment to their northern compatriots. Makerere University is the oldest institution of higher learning in East Africa and has a prestigious reputation. It sits on top of one of Kampala’s hills, overlooking the city and is home to about 38,000 students including post-graduates. Standing tall over the campus is the School of Food Technology, Nutrition and Bio-engineering, which is responsible for the new project. It all started with the Food Technology and Business Incubation Centre (FTBIC), an arm of the School of Food Technology, Nutrition and Bio-engineering, which nurtures business start-ups. The FTBIC is funded by the government and is an attempt to link the academic subject with the real world. At the same time, the School of Food Technology, Nutrition and Bio-engineering also houses FONUS (Food and Nutrition Solutions Ltd), a business providing consultancy from academic experts in the agriculture, nutrition and health sectors to local communities. In 2013, FONUS experts were in Yumbe District when they noticed the proliferation of mango trees growing wild. The trees were laden with growing fruit and the academics discovered that...

Co-operatives open opportunities for Rwanda cross-border traders. Driving south from Kigali to the Burundi border, you might think that Nemba is one of the luckier border towns in Rwanda. A good road connects its unusually quiet trading centre to the nation’s busy capital, and the journey lasts only an hour, unlike the winding, up-hill distances to other border towns. Surely no one in Nemba buying goods from Kigali to sell to Burundi, would have a hard time running a quick and easy cross-border business? Yet for women traders such as Benigne Maliboli, who sells a bottled local brew to Burundi, reduced transport costs to and from the capital did little to alleviate the gender-specific barriers to her cross-border trade.  Like many women traders, she lacked awareness of cross-border traders’ rights, rules and regulations as legislated by the East African Community. Today, thanks to TradeMark Africa (TMA) funded Rwandan NGO, Profemme/Twese Hamwe, the women know better. “We now know that there is someone at the border who can assist small-time cross-border traders, who gives us information we need about both sides of the border. Before, we were not aware that such services existed at the border,” Benigne Maliboli says of her newly formed co-operative. Many women traders purposefully do not register as such in order to bypass what they see as complications, and end up paying exorbitant bribes to keep their informal trade going. According to experts however, as informal as this trade is, it contributes significantly to the East African...

30-year-old Annie Nakizibu Mirembe has crossed borders in trade to market and expand her steel welding business. “I started doing it as a hobby because I love art and design. I never went to school to acquire this skill,” the graduate of Bachelor of Library and Information Science says of breaking barriers in the male-dominated steel welding world and attests to the opening up of markets in the East African Community. Ms. Mirembe employs six Ugandans and two Kenyans in her welding shop, based in Katwe, a Kampala suburb. As a cross border trader, Mirembe is no stranger to intra-regional trade challenges as just two weeks ago, she experienced a four day delay at the Malaba border as she shipped metal products to Kenya, “The system was down and no one explained. Such incidences make traders like us incur extra costs on accommodation and food and also delays our obligations to our clients.” She says. As a cross border trader, Mirembe is one of the few who grabbed the opportunities provided by EAC treaty and is already celebrating success. She has export clientele in Rwanda and Kenya and plans to enter the Burundi market in the near future.  The EAC Treaty states that the first stage of the integration would be the formation of a Customs Union with its primary objective being to facilitate inter and intra-regional trade in goods. “The trade system on the borders makes cross-border trade for small businesses like mine very fast and easy,” she says....

TMA is supporting SEATINI in Uganda to build capacity for export trade, specifically for maize and sesame, two key Uganda staples. The project is recording wins: hundreds of Farmers in Uganda’s Nakaseke district are now earning UGX 700 from 400 UGX for graded and sorted maize, according to an independent evaluation.   As Kamya Kirubira leads us through a syrup-coloured maize field in his home district of Nakaseke in Central Uganda, the hard leaves scratch gently against our skin, assuring us the crop is as dry as it looks. Juxtaposed against a powder blue sky, the rows of maize are an idyllic scene that could have come straight from the front of a well-branded breakfast cereal box. This is Nakaseke today. Maize is in high demand in East Africa. It is the foundation of every staple food, in every country in the region. Every morning, afternoon and evening, middle class families sit down to eat maize, whether in the form of a roasted maize cob, a bowl of ugali (maize porridge), a fried chapatti, or an intoxicating local brew. Kenya is opening up to Ugandan maize and other markets will surely follow, but only if the maize makes the grade. In fact, the demand for this cereal crop far outweighs its production in East Africa. Yet, by Kamya’s own accounts, he wasn’t always the 40-acre owning commercial farmer he is now, and Nakaseke wasn’t always hailed as a model district for maize growing. In fact in 2013, when the World...

Waziri Hussein, 38, growls as he shifts gears to inch his 40ft container Scania semi-trailer forward in the truck traffic emerging from Gate No 5, the international container terminal of the Dar es Salaam Port. The peak Friday exit traffic meant he had been queuing for at least an hour to get this far. Under a permanent cloud of dust in the blazing afternoon sun, Hussein’s three-member crew prepared to embark upon its 2,300km journey to Kisangani, the Democratic Republic of Congo. “In another two maybe three hours, we may reach Ubungo intersection,” says Hussein, frowning as he looks ahead over the traffic from his elevated vantage position. “What is annoying is that after enduring the long wait inside the gate, there are still about three checkpoints on just this 2km Bandari stretch, which only worsen the congestion, and then we still have to get across Mandela road to Ubungo.” Without a substantive, functioning railway system, trucks such as Hussein’s remain the main connector between the Port of Dar es Salaam and its clientele in seven countries, including Tanzania. This also means they are the landside manifestation of a critical set of challenges including clearing systems and seaside infrastructure, which together have contributed to the bothersome reputation for congestion that the Port of Dar es Salaam is currently battling to quash through concerted efforts. “It is a complex mix of challenges,” says Hebel Mhanga, the acting Port Manager. “We have a narrow and shallow entrance channel which can’t receive bigger...

From her small metal fabrication workshop in Kitwe, a Kampala suburb on Entebbe Road, Annie Nakizibu Mirembe has multinational ambitions. Her small business employs a workforce of Ugandans and Kenyans to make metal furniture, which she ships locally and into neighbouring Rwanda. Her steel is Ugandan and the sisal fibre she uses for cushions comes from Kenya. Mirembe now has her sights set on expanding across the border into Burundi after capturing the markets in Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda—capitalising on the opening up of regional markets resulting from the political and economic integration of the East African Community (EAC). The EAC’s Common Market Protocol allows for the free movement of goods and services, labour and capital across the borders of the region’s states. Despite the efforts at the political level to reduce friction for traders seeking to expand regionally, barriers still remain—not least a lack of knowledge amongst the population. Studies show awareness of the existence and benefits of a regional market are low in Uganda. In fact, small scale businesses like Mirembe's find it difficult to access information that would inform them of how to access and conduct themselves in neighbouring countries markets. “The first time I received a worthwhile order from Kigali—the Rwandan capital—I was nervous but also extremely excited. At that point, I did not know how to export steel products to neighbouring country, so I had to take time to research,” she says. Mirembe’s experience mirrors the challenge most citizens face across the EAC states in recent years. It is a need that...

Melkior Kilenga, second on the left in the picture, has been farming for more than thirty years, but has only been a resident of Mbingu village since 2008. A subsistence farmer before 2008, he has always grown plantain, rice, cocoa, fruits and vegetables, but since acquiring his two plots totalling 4.5 acres in Mbingu he has increasingly specialised in cocoa as a commercial crop. Before Kokoa Kamili’s arrival in Mbingu, Kilenga sold his cocoa to ‘Olam’ – an agri-business operating from seed to shelf. While Melkior’s relationship with Olam was largely trouble-free, the pre-Kokoa Kamili price seemed to be dictated by a small cartel of buyers from Iringa and Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) with little discrimination made in terms of farmers’ harvested products and product quality. Before Kokoa Kamili’s arrival in Mbingu there was no real market price, however their arrival quickly led to the introduction of a quality and pricing tier that resulted in better quality grades of cocoa being rewarded with a significantly higher price per kilo sold. Additionally, while Olam received their purchases at collection points, which came with an additional transport cost, Kokoa Kamili offered what was then an innovative collection service for the ‘wet’ cocoa at no extra charge. When Kokoa Kamili are not buying up harvested stock from the local producers, Melkior then sells to Olam, but on the basis of a substantially reduced purchase price to that offered by Kokoa Kamili’s in-season offer (less than 15%-25% per kilo).   Melkior continues to grow...

Assiimwe Allan is a 22-year-old student in his second year at the Makerere University, in Kampala, Uganda. He is pursuing a Bachelor of Science degree, taking statistics as his major and mathematics as his minor. In August 2015, Allan teamed up with five fellow hardworking students to form a transformation movement project called Coffee Max which will be operationalized through the registration of a business company at the Makerere University. The Coffee Max project intends to develop a new generation of young people to embrace and enjoy coffee in its full diversity. As a result, this will increase domestic coffee consumption amongst the young people and integrate them more along activities in the coffee value chain. Allan began this project with the aim to popularize coffee as a trendy beverage amongst university students which, in turn, would reduce alcoholism. He and his team participated in the annual Uganda coffee festival that was hosted in November 2015 and organized by NUCAFE in conjunction with the Uganda Coffee Developed Authority (UCDA). In addition, Allan developed a strong passion to boost his fellow young people, especially his fellow university students with entrepreneurial skills to assist them to be self-employed which in turn will reduce the overwhelming youth unemployment rate in Uganda. The project will start with the purchase of automated coffee vending machines that will offer a wider variety of coffee beverage. This will be followed with a vigorous coffee club at the Makerere University and accompanied by trendy promotional materials for awareness...