African startups are starting this year on a grand scale. Ghana’s Complete Farmer and Nigeria’s ReelFruit have secured US$50,000 each in funding after being peer-selected as winners of the Village Capital Agriculture Africa accelerator.
It was reported in September, 2019 that nine startups from across the continent had been selected for the programme run by Village Capital, which runs a host of accelerators across Africa using its innovative peer-selection method.
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Agriculture Africa 2019 was focused on solutions that improve outcomes for small farmers and address food security issues, and run in partnership with Small Foundation and Ceniarth, the latter of which committed US$50,000 to each of the top two peer-selected ventures.
The winners, who took home that funding, were Ghana’s Complete Farmer, which has developed an end-to-end digital agricultural platform that helps industries source for quality raw materials for their production, and Nigeria’s ReelFruit, which retails a range of six natural, healthy dried fruit and nut snacks, in over 250 retail supermarkets, airlines, hotels, and schools.
“I’m thrilled about the Africa Agriculture 2019 programme and the fact we had representation from Zambia for the first time, a Senegalese company representing Francophone Africa, and nine ventures from seven countries,” said Adedana Ashebir, regional manager for Africa at Village Capital.
“I’m proud of ReelFruit and Complete Farmer who consistently impressed their colleagues throughout the peer due diligence process.”
The other selected startups included two from Uganda — Akellobanker, which enables farmers to purchase inputs on credit, and Agro Supply, a mobile layaway product — and two from Kenya — workflow streamlining solution Capture and data platform Raino Tech4Impact.
Also selected were Senegalese online platform for fish products Aywajieune, Zambian inputs e-commerce startup eMsika, and Rwandan irrigation services firm Volta Irrigation.
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions.
He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance.
He is also an award-winning writer.
He could be contacted at udohrapulu@gmail.com