Farmerline, a Ghanaian agricultural business, has opened a branch in Cote d'Ivoire as part of its expansion into the West African subregion.
The company that offers technology-enabled services is organized to speed up support for small-scale farmers.
Using collaborations with local and international industry stakeholders, highly skilled field agents, farm resources, logistics, and award-winning digital technologies, Farmerline offers solutions to open up access to all participants in the agricultural value chain.
While Ivorian farmers will gain access to high-quality fertilizers and seeds, connections to international markets, and free training on climate-smart farming practices via an SMS shortcode (1349) similar to the emergency helpline, the operations in Cote d'Ivoire concentrate on strengthening partnerships across West Africa (911).
A decade ago, Alloysius Attah and Emmanuel Owusu Addai, the company's co-founders, developed Farmerline to send daily voice and SMS agronomic messages in the Ashanti Region's indigenous dialect to 800 farmers. Mergdata is the company's technological platform.
Since 2013, it has worked with more than 3,000 strategic partners in 48 countries, including government agencies, regional agribusinesses, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and food corporations. To date, these partners have licensed Mergdata to assist and better the lives of 1.7 million small-scale farmers.
Strategic growth
The growth is significant, according to Mr. Attah, since "more than three million smallholder farmers reside in Cote d'Ivoire, and Abidjan serves as the region's capital for francophone Africa.
"Over the previous six years, we've collaborated with partners who have used our technology in Cote d'Ivoire," he said.
The moment has come to increase and completely commit to assisting Ivorian agribusinesses in advancing the agenda for farmer and agribusiness digitisation, including developing and disseminating localized agronomic and agricultural services to benefit as many farmers as feasible in the nation.
Partnerships would be essential for achieving the potential, according to Mr. Attah, who also stated that Farmerline was quite enthusiastic about the opportunity in Cote d'Ivoire.
"We do not consider this to be a zero-sum game or a winner-take-all strategy." In order to achieve our goal of generating long-term profit for small farmers, we will keep working with regional agribusinesses, agricultural cooperatives, our current partners, the government, and food trading firms.
Farmerline reported a $14.4 million pre-Series A investment round the previous year, and they expanded their workforce throughout the West African region.
Joel Amani Kouame, the organization's new country manager for Cote d'Ivoire and regional manager for Francophone Africa, said, "Our team is pleased to offer our solutions to Cote d'Ivoire, and we look forward to assisting the farmers in this region."
Economies in Africa
He asserted that agriculture remained the backbone of African economies and that it could be made more effective by incorporating big data management and predictive analytics into farming together with timely delivery of high-quality inputs, agronomic guidance, and a market for smallholders.
"We think that our approach to agriculture may benefit small-scale farmers in the long run and promote regional economic development," the man stated.
More than 100 business leaders attended the event, including Mme Yvette Daoud, the Dutch Ambassador to Cote d'Ivoire, while some of the company's current and upcoming local partners, such as Beyond Beans, TechnoServe, Bayer, and Locagri, presented what they were bringing to the table.
According to Fayelle Ouane, Country Director for TechnoServe in Cote d'Ivoire, "the rural sector in Cote d'Ivoire has increased in recent years, in part due to the sophistication of cooperatives and the increasing role they play in agricultural communities."
"We're happy to collaborate with Farmerline to offer new approaches and enhanced possibilities to farmers across the nation."
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