Contract farming is all about contracting a farmer to farm for you and deliver a specified quantity of farm produce to a specified location on a specified date.
Crowd farming is pooling together funds to sponsor a farming project and sharing the profit with all the people that participated in the fundraising.
Many agritech startups in Nigeria are practicing crowd farming. Farm4Me stands out in offering contract farming in Nigeria.
Farm4me is the first in Nigeria to pioneer contract farming. Potential Clients sign up on their website. Receive cost total breakdown and projected yield and profit document. Make a decision on the crop and number of hectares and notify Farm4Me.
The service agreement is sent to the potential client to study carefully, sign and send back. Farm4Me signs their part of the service agreement and send the final copy to the potential Client. Once the contract has been activated, the invoice will be generated and sent to the potential Client. He makes payment and notifies Farm4Me.
Then work begins immediately on the farming project. The Client is updated on the progress of the farm.
The most outstanding part of what this startup offers is the fact that all their farms are insured by Leadway Assurance to reduce the risk of farm disaster and other losses. Should there be a low yield below the invested capital, Farm4Me undertakes to refund the client’s capital. So the client is shielded from the risk associated with farming.
The startup also undertakes with the permission of the Client to sell the farm produce at the prevailing market price and credit the client’s bank account. Or ship the farm produce to the client’s specified address on a specified date.
Asked what the cost of production entails, the CEO, Adama J. Adama said: “it covers land leasing, land clearing, land tilling, buying of seeds, planting of seeds, weeding, fertilizer and pesticide application, harvest, packaging, and transportation”.
We asked about the patronage of the contract farming service, Mr. Adama said: “we receive on the average 15 sign-ups every day”.
The most interesting part of this innovative agribusiness is the fact that it creates jobs for landowners, tractor operators, vulnerable women and youths who engage in the farm labor and farm input suppliers.
Since they started nine months ago, they have given direct and indirect jobs to over 20, 000 people.
The Founder and CEO said their vision is to build a multibillion-dollar agribusiness company in Nigeria with tangible social impact.
We asked how Farm4Me is able to convince Clients to part with hard-earned money. The CEO said “I go the extra mile to build trust and address the fears and doubts of the potential clients. It takes days and weeks of questions and answers. Sharing of my sensitive data like my National Identity card, Police Character Certificate, CAC Certificate, and Leadway Assurance Insurance Certificate. Some go as far as contacting Leadway to find out if we actually insure our farms with them. Some visit our office to interact with us face to face before making payment. We are brutally honest with them. In the end, they pay us to farm for them. We have a good number of clients that have paid us to farm for them.”
What is the future of agribusiness in Nigeria?
The future is having rich data of all the agribusiness value chain players and make them accessible to the public to build great products off it. The future is so bright. We are excited about feeding Nigeria, putting smiles on the smallholder farmers and creating jobs for vulnerable women and youths.
