24 Year Old Graduate Runs a One Stop Shop for Agribusiness Solutions

A new breed of graduates is realizing that the elusive white collar job is not worth chasing after all. This crop of young energetic entrepreneurs have their eyes on good money and salaries will not give them that. They have turned to agriculture.

The lingo of making a decent income is now old fashioned. The new lingo is banking big from agribusiness. Integrating traditional agriculture with new technology is the tool young graduates are using to make a tidy sum of money. These entrepreneurs are using knowledge gained from various courses at the university to create innovative products and add value to the existing products. The focus is on good agronomic practices to produce high quality yield.

John Maingi, 24 years old, is one entrepreneur with his eyes on the agricultural value chain. He identifies gaps in the value chain and creates products to fill those gaps. The IT graduate from USIU is the founder and director of Foods Africa Enterprises. The company that I would like to call a one stop shop for all your agribusiness needs.

John Maingi, Founder and Director of Foods Africa Enterprises

If you have money and no land or time, John and his team will sell agribonds to you. If you have land and no idea where to start with farming, John will offer consultancy. Or perhaps you started your project and you are stuck half way, Foods Africa Enterprises will bring you back on track. Maybe you need seedlings, fertilizer or farm equipment, John is your guy.

The innovator of agribonds

I first met John Maingi at the annual Agri-Pro Focus Network Day in Nairobi. He was exhibiting his company’s products and the term agribonds caught my attention. I had to probe further being the blogger I am.

“Agribonds is a new product in the market. It target executives in the corporate world who have the money but no time and/or no land to get into agribusiness” explained an enthusiastic John.

In a nutshell, you give Foods Africa Enterprises your money, they invest it for you and bring you the profit. That is typically growing your money without moving a muscle. For instance, if you have Ksh. 100,000, you schedule a meeting with Mr. Maingi and his team. At the meeting you will be advised on the best crop to grow depending on the season and market. After agreeing on how to share profits, the work begins. Foods Africa takes care of land hiring, seeds, water, harvesting and even selling.  They keep you updated on the whole process and email you details of expenditure. After harvesting, you get back your initial capital and a profit.

Agribonds is just one of the innovative products that Foods Africa has in its array of innovative products. John and his team process and package pure honey from Kitui. They supply chicken, rabbit meat, turkey and, quail eggs and meat. They also supply fresh high quality cereals and vegetables to Veg Pro, Nameelok Group of Hotels, Fresh and Juicy among other companies.

Foods Africa emphasizes on high quality produce

Quality is uncompromised at Foods Africa. John has quality control team at his company that ensures each produce is of the best quality. I noticed John’s keen eye and attention to quality when we were at one of his client’s green house project in Ruai, where I conducted the interview for this post. In the middle of the conversation, John would reach out for a capsicum tree and comment about the leaves and flowers. He would quickly identify areas of the green house that required more attention. He can easily pass for an agronomist with his easy interaction with crops. He tells me he has learnt all he knows about crops out of interest.

Humble beginnings

Foods Africa Enterprises is 5 years old. It was conceived in 2009. John set up a small green house at his home 5 years ago. The project was a success and that pushed him to expand the green house. Soon John’s neighbours were interested in green house farming and they quickly picked it up. In no time, there was too much produce and no market or at times the market was flooded.

Entrepreneurship is about strategically positioning a service or product once opportunity strikes. John realised that a link was missing between farmers and the market. He started collecting produce from neighbouring farmers to increase his yield and supplying it on large scale. The demand for produce grew and he had to supply beyond his neighbourhood to other regions in Kenya. It became necessary at this stage to operate a business entity as opposed to operating as an individual. That is how Foods Africa was born.

Entrepreneurship is all about strategy

Mr. Maingi attending to one of his clients, Ms. Linda Atambitsa

“You’ve got to think outside the box,” is a phrase that John kept quoting during the interview. He has mastered the art of packaging products and services that are market oriented.

For instance, there is an avalanche for quail farming at the moment. These farmers require cages, licences, incubators, fertilized eggs or chicks to get started. Foods Africa provides these products and also trains new farmers on how to rear these valuable birds. As the director of Foods Africa Enterprises, I gotta say, John Maingi has a knack for thinking outside the box.

Sort Your Kitchen Garbage for a Decent Income

What happens to all the garbage from your kitchen? How much do you pay garbage services every month to dispose waste from your house? Three sassy ladies, Millicent Mwihaki, Eunice Wambura and Fidelis Wangechi make money from kitchen waste that no one thinks about.

From left to right: Millicent Mwihaki, Fidelis Wangechi and Eunice Wambura

Today, human life is constantly threatened by chronic diseases such as cancer, diabetes and heart diseases. Health and medical pundits have narrowed down the cause for these diseases to one term, lifestyle. As my gym instructor likes to say, what you eat is what you fit.  How then do you fight these life threatening diseases? Organic food is the answer. It is free from inorganic fertilizer and pesticide residues.

All things organic

The buzz for all things organic has created numerous opportunities in the organic value chain where young enterpreneurs can benefit. In the organic farming value chain there are untapped markets in soil tillage, bio fertilizers, bio pesticides and marketing. Agripreneurs have an opportunity to do the dirty and reap big.

Red wigglers (Eisenia Fetida)

Millicent, Eunice and Fidelis found an untapped area in organic farming. They formed a group by the name Young Mkulima Self Help Group. They breed red wigglers or red earth worms that produce vermi compost and vermi juice. Vermi compost is a bio fertiliser used in organic farming. Vermi juice is used as top dressing for crops. 1 kg of red earthworms goes for Ksh. 2500. The worms take 4 weeks to breed and they multiply at an extremely high rate. The ladies also make extra money from vermi juice that goes for Ksh. 500 a litre.

Agriculture is not all dirt

When I first met Millicent, the team leader, her nails were neatly manicured, her make up was intact and her chic dressing described her nothing as a farmer. She looked like a business lady ready to sign a deal any time. She is a graduate of Kenyatta University. I was waiting for her to introduce me to a farm hand who helps the team with the worms business.

To my rude surprise there was no farm hand. Millicent introduced me to the Young Mkulima team: Fidelis the group secretary and Eunice the group treasurer. The three chic ladies do the work themselves. They get worms for Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT). They place them in a worm bin. The bin has to be prepared before putting in the worms. Key materials required to prepare for breeding worms are: ballast, moist organic waste, a gunny bag and some dry grass for mulching.

Young Mkulima's worm bin

How to the group breeds red wigglers

Step 1. Make a small hole in at the bottom of the plastic bin. Fix a small pipe at the hole to drain the vermi juice; the excess water that drains out from the organic foods.

Step 2. Put ballast in the worm bin. Let it settle at the bottom of the container. The ballast drains out and sieves the excess water that forms vermi juice.

Step 3. Place a gunny bag on top of the ballast.

Red wigglers feeding on organic waste

Step 4. Put in your worms. You could start off with 1 kg to learn the craft.

Step 5. Pour in the organic waste for the worms to feed on.

Step 6.  Keep watering the bin regularly. You could use the water used to clean dishes from you kitchen.

Step 7. Place the mulching on the bin to insulate it. Red wigglers do not like sunlight. They will crawl to the bottom of the bin to run from sunlight if they are exposed to too much sunlight.

Step 8. Keep watering your bin to ensure the organic waste is moist at least once a day and constantly add organic waste to the bin.

Harvesting worms and worm juice

The target market for Millicent’s group is organic farmers. Farmers buy worms to make vermi compost, a rich bio fertilizer. The ladies also sell vermi juice or worm juice that is used as top dressing for organic farming. One litre bottle of vermi juice retails at Ksh. 500.

Young Couple Eyes Huge Returns from Pedigree Goats and Sheep

Pure Boran cattle at the Munyu ranch

Mr. and Mrs Francis Kimani cannot recall the last time they bought beef, mutton or chicken at a butchery. When Mrs. Violet Kimani has chicken on her menu for dinner, Mr. Kimani drops by their farm and brings home healthy looking kienyeji (local) chicken. 

 The young couple has 95 cattle, 196 goats and sheep on their 11 acre land in Munyu, Kiambu County. They also have several bee hives, chicken and turkey on the farm. At the age of 30 and 27 years respectively, Mr and Mrs. Kimani may so far sound to many young people like a couple that lives in a village somewhere, where all they do is farming. Well, you would be wrong to judge them as so.

Mrs. Violet and Mr. Francis Kimani at their ranch

The two graduates are rising high on the corporate ladder with their careers. Mrs Violet Kimani for instance, is the Founder and Director of Van kym Consultancy East Africa, the only public relations firm based in Thika town. They are not jobless people who decided to turn to agriculture because they could not find good jobs. They are entrepreneurs who saw an opportunity in pedigree breeding and farming.

 Pedigrees fetch much more in the market

Pedigrees are pure breeds of goat and sheep kept for either meat or milk. Mr. and Mrs. Kimani have 15 pedigree Doper sheep and 62 pedigree Galla goat reared purely for meat. They also have 119 cross breeds.

The difference between a pedigree sheep and a cross breed or a common breed is that after one year a pedigree weighs 150 kgs live weight and the common breed weighs only 80 kgs. In the market, at three months the pure breed or pedigree sheep will cost Ksh. 25,000 while the first generation (FI) of a cross breed costs Ksh. 15,000 and the second generation (F2) of a cross breed costs Kshs. 17,000.

Six months old pure Doper sheep weighing 75kgs

Just in case I lost you there with the cross breed generations I will try explaining it. A common breed doe (female goat) served with a pure breed buck (male goat) will reproduce a cross breed of the first generation, F1. When the cross breed doe is served with a purebred buck the kid is a cross breed of F2 generation. Serving an F2 cross breed doe with pure breed buck will give you a new line of pure breeds.

Mr. and Mrs Kimani target the festive seasons of the year to reap from their flock of sheep and goats. Their top customers are individuals who buy livestock for meat and farmers who seek for breeders. On average the couple fetches about Kshs. 80,000 from their goats and sheep each festive season. Considering their large farm has cattle, chicken and turkey as well, the youthful farmers have a bounty reap during festive seasons such as Easter, Christmas and Ramadhan.

Keeping livestock will always put some money in your pocket even off festive seasons. Each evening Mr. and Mrs. Kimani pocket Ksh. 30,000 from the manure collected in the animals’ sheds. With the current buzz for organic farming, manure is high on demand. Farmers are constantly searching for manure and the Kimani's have it in plenty as a byproduct.

“You can never go wrong with farming. Keeping livestock whether for dairy or meat is the way to go,” avers Mr. Kimani. “Land is fast diminishing in the country. The available land is quickly being developed for real estate. I strongly feel that by 2030, farmers will be the envy of many. Farming will be cool again because it will be lucrative with a few players in it,” he continues.

The Kimani's flock of sheep and goats

You can start small

Mr. Kimani started his ranch with three goats in 2010. Three years later his ranch is bee hive of activities and a host to many animals. “I started livestock farming out of a passion I had for pure breeds. It has now grown into an enterprise with time,” he observes.

The couple will soon register their line of pure breeds with the Kenya Stud Book. This will see their livestock tremendously appreciate in value. This will definitely add a bounce to their happy walk to the bank.

A Research Project Inspired by His Mother Grows into Lucrative Business

Renown world-class companies worth billions of dollars were established by college students. Think of companies such as Google, Microsoft and Yahoo.  Often, these companies are products of research projects that graduate students undertake. In a few instances, undergraduates such as Mark Zuckerberg the founder of Facebook and Matt Mullenweg the founder of WordPress have built successful companies.

Mr. Abraham Wahid addresses rosella farmers in Kirinyaga County

 Abraham Wahid may not be ranked with the likes of Zuckerberg, but he is an entrepreneur who conducted his undergraduate research with the aim of turning it into a business empire. At 28 years of age, Mr. Wahid is the director of Rosella Functional Beverage and Foods Company. An enterprise he founded through his undergraduate research.

  

Inspired by his mother

While in third year, Wahid went home for holiday awaiting to join his final year the next semester. As with every final year student in campus, he was expected to come up with a research project. To most undergraduates, research is just another requirement to successfully complete a course. Well aware of the task awaiting him in college, Wahid was keen to note any problems that required further investigation in his field of food science and technology.

On one evening, while at home, Wahid was served an unusual drink that was purple in color by his mother. She claimed that the drink was a rich antioxidant with numerous medicinal benefits. As a food science student the funny looking concoction caught Wahid’s attention and he decided to carry one of the rosella plants to the university lab and test the benefits that his mother claimed.

Rosella plant whose fruits are used to produce Rosella Drink

 Sponsored to carry on with research

Wahid reviewed lots of literature on the plant, studied it widely and documented it for his research project. Following his promising research, he was offered a scholarship by the university to carry on his undergraduate study at masters level. After graduating with his second degree in 2011, Wahid established his company, Rosella Functional Beverages and Foods, with some funding from JKUAT to produce his flagship product, Rosella Drink.

Rosella Drink is a natural healthy juice that is free from chemicals. The rosella fruits that Wahid uses in his production of beverages are organically grown by Kenyan small scale farmers.  The fruits are dried in the sun by farmers before selling them to Rosella Company. A kilogram of dried rosella fruits goes for Kshs. 1,000. A farmer can harvest 500 kgs of rosella fruits from one acre of land. To-date Wahid has 500 farmers in Kirinyaga, Kitale and Taita.

Rosella herbal tea

Rosella company has grown in the last two years to include products such as Rosella Herbal Tea, RosellaWine and Rospyne (Rosella apple wine). Rosella Drink is now the drink of choice in Mwea, in Kirinyaga County where Wahid piloted Rosella farming. The drink is widely consumed in institutions such as JKUAT and Dedan Kimathi University. Corporates also place orders for the healthy drink during functions.

 Research in agriculture pays

“Research in agriculture and food production has great potential commercially. There are many gaps that exist in the agricultural value chain and it is up to the academics to fill them,"  he advises. "I had a hunch that I was onto something big when the university showed interest in my work and  I was called back to do my masters. I really thank my mom for serving me that odd looking purple drink years back. It has employed me and my staff members,” contiues Wahid, currently a PhD candidate at Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology.

5 Benefits of Rosella Drink

Wahid's Rosella Drink

1.      It is free from chemicals

2.      It is an antioxidant

3.      It soothes colds

4.      Helps digestion

5.      It’s very sweet; sweetened by natural honey!

Former Cashier Cashing in on Chicken

After completing her training as an accountant, Esther Mwangi landed a job as a cashier in a firm in Westlands. Like any other fresh graduate, she was proud to have landed a job right in the heart of the city. A few months on her job, Esther had too many needs and her meager salary seemed to shrink every month. With a salary of Kshs. 15,000 and commuting to Westlands from Githurai every morning, she could not make her ends meet. She had rent to pay, she had to feed, clothe and save for the future.

Esther Mwangi, a poultry farmer based at Membley Estate, along Thika Road

“Life was unrewarding to my long hours counting money for my employer every day. I lived hand to mouth waiting on my peanut earnings to get through four excruciating weeks before the next pay day” Esther recalls.

She had to boost her income to survive. She tried her hand at buying chicken from farmers in Kikuyu, Uthiru and Mwiki (Kasarani area) and selling them to start up restaurants along Thika Road. She would buy the chicken on her way from work and deliver them early in the morning before going to work the next day. She would a make a profit of Kshs. 30 for each chicken she sold. Simple economies of scale quickly translated into profit for the young mother of two. 

Selling chicken to boost income

Esther would buy 100 chickens from farmers and make Kshs. 3,000 upon delivering them to restaurants. Two orders a week would make Esther Kshs. 4,000 richer after deducting her transport expenses. In a month, Esther would make more than her salary from selling chicken. It soon made more sense to quit her job and concentrate on buying and selling chicken to the ever growing market.

Getting into chicken farming

Three months into her new business, Esther realized she had too many orders and the farmers she was buying from would not meet the demand. As an entrepreneur she saw an opportunity and grabbed it. She started rearing broiler chicken.

 “This is the wisest decision I ever made,” says Esther. Since 2009, the former cashier has been rearing broiler chicken and supplying it to restaurants along Thika road such as Comfy Inn, Upways restaurant, Eagles Restaurant and Lily restaurant.

Every three weeks Esther has 380 chicken to supply and 500 hundred others that she is rearing. Broiler chicken is only reared for meat and has a fast maturity rate of 6 weeks. Esther always has two groups of these domestic fowls with a three weeks age difference. After selling each bunch she quickly replaces it with one day old chicks and the cycle begins again.

Esther, 34 years old, makes a clean profit of Kshs. 91,450 from her business every six weeks. She has employed two people to help her run her business. She confesses that she can never get back to formal employment even for a higher pay than her the income she gets from her business.

Esther supplies 380 chicken every three weeks

“Chicken farming is simple logic,” she says. “You feed the birds in the morning, then feed them again at around 11 am and feed them one last time in the evening. So long as they are healthy and in a clean environment, you will always smile to bank.” Esther says the simple approach to her business frees up her time to look for new markets, attend chamas and bring up her children.

Entrepreneurship is not for the slothful

Esther advises young people who are wish to get into poultry farming to be hardworking (she wakes up at 5.00 a.m to feed her chicken), aggressive at searching for markets and have a clear goal. Esther is working towards opening a distribution center at Githurai where she can sell her chicken on retail in addition to her existing business. Another key pointer for success in the supplying business is to keep old contacts and treat customers with dignity. Each customer is the key to your next customer. 

As you enjoy chicken on your extended Mashujaa holiday challenge yourself to start an income generating business especially in the agricultural value chain. There is little to lose when you try.