African Agtech Market Map: 99 Technologies Changing the Future of Agriculture in Africa

Their goal is to contribute to the African agricultural progress towards a system with optimized resource allocation through technology. There are seven billion people on the planet and more than one-quarter of them suffer from malnutrition, mostly in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

By 2050, the global population is expected to reach 9 billion people and the number of under-nourished children to uptick by 25 million. Innovative solutions need to be implemented and technology and information sharing can help produce enough food and correctly distribute it around the planet. The African continent has huge potential with 60% of world’s non-cultivated arable lands but still spends $25 billion annually on food inbound shipments.

Africa could play a major role and take on future food challenges, yet it needs to leapfrog the innovation gap with other continents to produce enough food for its own population and work toward becoming a food exporter. Even though African growers are attached to their traditions and quite reluctant to change, they are not immune to the technology revolution.

Wanda Organic is a Kenyan start-up providing organic bio-fertilizers to small and medium-sized farmers in order to improve their soil health and yields. Another business, InteliSeed from South Africa, partnered with Syngenta to provide growers with optimized seeds that can offer them an butter output and quality for their harvests. Resources Access Smallholder producers are operating on just a few acres of land, yet represent 80% of the food production in Africa.

For instance: Ojay Greene (Kenya) offers training, advisory services and trade access for underserved smallholder growers; ICT4Dev (Côte d’Ivoire) integrates ICT solutions for growers’ problems through platform design, web management tools, mobile, SMS and voice; AgroSpaces (Cameroon) is a networking site connecting agricultural communities to share information and form valuable connections. Data on soil and crops are obtained with sensors and producers can get real-time information and advice by SMS. Sokopepe is another Kenyan startup offering marketplace information and holding records management services through FARMIS , a estate management. Diagnostic tool and SOKO+ , a digital commodity trading and information system, linking small-scale growers to end retailers and bulk purchasers of produce.

Holding Robotics, Mechanization & Equipment Startups are working on automating many repetitive, tiring tasks in order for producers to save time and energy. The Institue for Grape and Wine Sciences is also working on a robot in South Africa for data gathering purposes on vineyards.

Some Agtech start-ups are laying the foundation for a leaner supply chain, including quality testing devices, sensors for products’ traceability. Safety, and smart logistics. iProcure is the largest agricultural supply chain platform in rural Africa. AfriSoft is a technology and software solutions provider in South Africa that addresses challenges such as warehouse management, quality, traceability and production tracking.

AgriBusiness Marketplaces In Africa, the food supply chain is highly dependent on middlemen that take advantage of smallholder growers given their limited market connectivity. M-Farm is a Kenyan startup providing a platform to connect producers directly to buyers and inform them of quotation trends to optimize planting and harvesting timing.

Novel Farming Systems The decreasing percentage of arable lands along with mounting pressure of climate change calls for more sustainable processes to produce food with fewer resources. Africa has the potential to turn into the breadbasket of the world, but the way is still long and arduous.