Thrive Agric (Nigeria): The company helps smallholder farmers in Nigeria access crowdfunded loans to help grow their crops, as well as help them sell their produce.
Q1: Hi, Uka, What's your educational background, what were you working on before this startup Thrive Agric, What's your work experience, and can you introduce your business to our users?
I am a graduate of Biochemistry from Covenant University, Ota Nigeria. Before starting Thrive Agric in 2017, in 2014 I had previously co-founded a supply chain company called Quick Leap with my longtime business partner Ayodeji Arikawe who is also the co-founder of Thrive Agric, at Quick Leap we linked farmers in Benue state, Nigeria to premium off-takers so as to solve the problem they face of having 6 middlemen between them and premium off-takers. After 2 years of running the company, we got selected into Ventures Platform (An acceleration program that trains and equips startup co-founders with the right business knowledge).
During the acceleration program, we decided to research more on what are the real problems Nigerian smallholder farmers face so as to provide lasting solutions in order to boost their production and income, we then realized that they lacked access to finance, quality inputs, and premium off-takers. With this, we founded Thrive Agric in 2017, an agricultural technology-enabled company that works with smallholder farmers in Nigeria to give them access to finance through linkages with institutional investors and via crowdfunding where Nigerian urban dwellers both home and abroad can fund a local farmer and get predictable returns after harvest for every farming cycle, with this Thrive Agric has been able to provide tech-enabled precision farming services, data-driven advisory and increased yield per hectare of these smallholder farmers in Nigeria and link them to premium market
Q2: How did you get into the agricultural industry? How did it happen?
Upon graduation, I traveled home to visit my parents and I decided to explore the agriculture value chain considering where I was from was an agrarian community I started a small scale farming at the back of my parent's house. In 2014, I realized that in Benue state, most farmers find it hard to link up with premium off-takers and even if they do they were not able to easily transport their goods. With this, I decided to start up a  supply chain company called Quick Leap which has now evolved into Thrive Agric.
Q3: What experience or idea inspired you to get started with Thrive Agric and what does it mean to you in today's Nigeria agricultural industry? (If you can, please attach related photos about that experience )
Today there are over 32 million smallholder farmers in Nigeria alone and it increases across Africa who occupy the bulk of the food production chain, yet Nigeria imports almost 70% of the food it consumes because the smallholder farmers are still not able to cater to the populations daily consumption not to talk of exporting their produce, due to all the difficulties they face all along the agricultural value chain; they cannot acquire quality inputs and farming technologies and are still using the old farming method.
Food insecurity is increasing by the number, today we have 46.1 million persons of the entire population food insecure, while 24.8% of the entire population is prevalent to food insecurity and the population of Nigeria is also growing massively. Nigeria is projected to increase by more than 50% in the coming two decades, and during this, its rural population is projected to increase by more than 25%, and the agricultural component is expected to grow by a slightly lower proportion, moderated by climate change and undercapitalization of the smallholder farmers.
If the agricultural sector is not well developed and farmers well equipped so as to increase their present production capacity and at the same time increased in number so as to meet the growing demand, then we are in deep trouble as a Nation. Hence, I am very much more inspired to continue the work we are doing in the agricultural space, so as to bring about food security to my lovely country as well as help in developing more tech-related solutions that would help the entire sector and boost the countries economy.
Q4: How does Thrive Agric work? How do you find farmers who want to work with you? Why do buyers fund into your farms? How can they get profitable returns back
At Thrive Agric we are very farmers centered oriented, hence all we do is to make sure our farmers are well sorted out in order to bring about more quality yield, so as to increase the profitability of both our farmers and subscribers (this are our co-farmers who fund farms).
How we do this is through backward integration, by first getting the off-takers, then the farmers, before the subscribers. We make sure that we meet and secure deals with premium off-takers in both the grain and livestock sector, after which we carry out a farmer onboarding process whereby our field agents and extension service experts go into the farming community that we are interested in, get a lead farmer who is then able to identify all farmers in that community, we then talk to the community leader who guarantees the farmers, after which our field agents collect the farmers database through our farmer onboarding app.
Our co-farmers who we get through both our crowdfunding platform and from institutional investors invest in our farmers because we give them the platform to work with farmers thereby contributing to the development of the Nation, they also get competitive ROI within a reasonable time frame of our farming cycle, they have the opportunity of rolling over, as our co-farmers they get regular updates through their mobile devices, and have the opportunity of visiting their farms if  they want to.
Our co-farmers get profitable returns back through their bank account before any farm is funded they see their ROI through our platform www.thriveagric.com and it easy for them to know their exact date of return and what amount to expect.
Q5: What are your thoughts on the current state of online funding investment in farms and agriculture industry in Nigeria? Why should buyers and investors give funds via your platform?
We think we have been able to figure out the key things, provide visibility of the farmers and their processes, provide the extension services to ensure optimal productivity , insurance against losses and a ready market for the produce.
Q6: How did you find your co-founder (s) and employees? What's the story on how you setup your team? (please attach some team photos and co-founders photos)
I and my co-founder Ayodeji Arikawe have known each other since our first year in the university as we were both studying for our undergraduate degree courses, he is a tech enthusiast and very intelligent person, we have been doing business dealings together and have co-founded a company before Thrive Agric as I have previously stated.
My awesome A-Team (Employees) are enthusiasts of agriculture as regards technology, development, and empowerment. We find our teammate mostly through referrals and job advert placement. Most of our teammates have been with us before we even registered Thrive Agric as a company and because they believe in the vision of the company.
Q7: When you guys began to build this startup, What were the difficulties your team faced and how did you guys fix them?
We had difficulty getting the right people to join the team and had to rely heavily on referrals. We also needed to gain credibility to investors and did this by sharing regular updates.
Q8: How did you get the initial money you used to start your business? Did you raise some investment from some angel investors like other companies?
We started the company through individual funds and was able to raise our first seed capital from Ventures Platform in 2017.
Q9: How did you attract new users to your platform and scale your business? How do you find more co-farmers to use your platform? What are the useful and practical operation methods you can share?
We can proudly state that we have spent less than $100 on advertisements, most of our new users are gotten through referrals, our platform has been scaled through our social media platform, all thanks to the companies growth team. The company has scaled from inception to date by being goal oriented driven, whatever target we set we make sure we work hard to hit the target, we started with just 100 farmers and in 18 months we are working with 17,000 farmers and by the end of 2019 we would be working with 35,000 farmers and we plan to scale up to 1 million farmers in 3 years.
Our operational method is to make sure that the Operations team are well equipped, all our field agents are gotten from the community we farm this way we are also creating job opportunities for the youths of the community we work with, thereby creating accountability and easy process.
Q10: How can you secure your farmers are reliable and trustworthy? Would investors lose their money and get nothing possibly? How to avoid this happen? Can you recommend one successful fund investing examples from your website? What is the link of it? (If you can, please attach related photos about these )
Our farmers onboarding process is very thorough, because we want to make sure we get the right farmers, who are accountable and trustworthy. We make sure that we get a lead farmer in the community who then get other farmers that he or she can vouch for, these farmers are then verified by the community leader and their data collected. All the farmers are then put in a cooperative where everyone is accountable for each other, we make sure that their farms are not more than 5 kilometers away from each other and all the inputs and services are given at the same time and harvest is done at the same time.
We make sure that our farmers receive weather update and also extension services through SMS as a preventive measure. In all this, we still make sure all our farms are insured and our co-farmers are guaranteed their capital in case of anything. So far, all our funding opportunities have been successful and we have paid over 16 cycles.
Q11: Have you experienced startup failures before? If YES, what did you learn from it?
Yes , in our earliest days, we had people on the team who didn't fit into startup culture and felt guilty about trying to let them go. We then realized that by keeping them we were holding on to their growth. Also and just really learnt to hire quick and fire quick.
Q12: How did you grow your revenue? What's the story behind how you got your first revenue from clients?
Our very first clients where our close friends and family members, we pitched the idea to them and told them how much profit they would get and due to the act that they believed in us, they invested their money and that's how we bought our very first good and sent to Lagos for our first Royal Exchange, with this we got accepted into Ventures Platform acceleration program who then gave us our seed fund in which we used to start working with farmers.
Q13: What operational data can you share? Your user amounts, revenues, employee numbers, etc.
In just 19 months, Thrive Agric has worked with over 17,000 smallholder farmers on majorly crops and livestock production who indirectly employ at least 3 people to work with them across 13 States in Nigeria, have reared 2 million poultry birds being the largest poultry farm in the country, this operation has been funded by over 5,000 subscribers, and on average have increased their yield threefold as a result. And our team comprises of 25 fully employed staff.
Q14: What advice do you have for newcomers who want to get into agriculture?
I would encourage everyone to go into the agriculture space, the space comprises of different sectors, its not only about farming of crops, we have different aspects of farming such as horticulture, livestock rearing(poultry and ruminant), micro livestock (snail, grasscutter etc), fish farming, vegetable farming etc. And in the agricultural value chain you could go into transportation, processing, buying from farmers and selling to processing companies, selling of inputs etc.
So my advice to any newcomer is to make sure they start small and smart, do not expect to make it immediately, be ready for failure and disappointment, but make sure you get back on your fit, correct your mistakes and start again. Insure your farms, read and learn new ways to do what you want to do effectively, get a mentor, and make sure you get the of-taker buy in before starting the business.
Q15: What's your goals for your business? Why are the goals important to you?
Our long term goal is to have on-boarded close to 10 million farmers in the next 6 years, a million farmers in 3 years, rear 10 million poultry birds in 3 years time, be the number one go to agricultural technology in the agricultural space of Africa, help Nigeria and Africa as a whole attain food security and SDG Goal 1 by 2030, be the number 1 agricultural exporting company in Nigeria, expand to other African countries, improve the agricultural value chain in Nigeria and some parts of Africa by 50% and overall aid in the affordability of quality food for all in Nigeria and most parts of Africa.
This is very important to us because we want to build an Africa that feeds itself and the world, thereby curbing unemployment, malnutrition, underdevelopment, and achieving the Sustainable Development Goal 2 (End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture).
Q16: How do you keep learning? Where do you go to learn more?
I learn from my mentors, experts with long term experience in the space, business experts in the space, online courses, acceleration and incubation programs and most importantly I read a lot and learn from doing (personal experience)
Q17: What do you do on a daily or weekly basis that you think is important in terms of forming your opinions on the agriculture space or sector?
On a daily and weekly basis I make sure I read on the improved ways of doing agriculture, I go to visit my farms in different states of the nation, I have meetings with experts in the space, I watch videos on agriculture, and or the past 2-3 months I have been learning from experts within and outside the country.
Q18: What's your biggest surprise over the last three or four years in the agricultural industry where you have been working? What happened that you didn't expect?
My biggest surprise was farmers orientation and mindset, most Nigerian farmers have the sense of entitlement and are used to a particular archaic mindset on how to farm, what to expect from loaners, and not wanting to pay back loans. But we are here to change the narrative to a better one and we are already doing so.
Q19: What's your plan for your business in the next few months? What's your business roadmap for next year?
By the end of 2019 we plan to have worked with 35,000 smallholder farmers and reared 3 million poultry birds
Q20: Where can we get more official info about you and your company?
Please visit our website www.thriveagric.com
Read about us on;
Business Day (http://www.businessdayonline.c ... ture/ ),
Quartz (http://disrupt-africa.com/2018 ... ward/ ),
Techpoint (https://techpoint.africa/2018/ ... africa) ,
Techcrunch (https://techcrunch.com/2019/03 ... o-day/) ,
and Disrupt Africa (http://disrupt-africa.com/2018 ... rmers/) .
Read online Articles on the CEO Uka Eje;
https://www.bellanaija.com/201 ... rity/
https://techmoran.com/2018/03/ ... gric/
https://www.theafricaceoforum. ... /eje/
https://innovation-village.com ... gric/
https://www.theafricaceoforum. ... /eje/
I am a graduate of Biochemistry from Covenant University, Ota Nigeria. Before starting Thrive Agric in 2017, in 2014 I had previously co-founded a supply chain company called Quick Leap with my longtime business partner Ayodeji Arikawe who is also the co-founder of Thrive Agric, at Quick Leap we linked farmers in Benue state, Nigeria to premium off-takers so as to solve the problem they face of having 6 middlemen between them and premium off-takers. After 2 years of running the company, we got selected into Ventures Platform (An acceleration program that trains and equips startup co-founders with the right business knowledge).
During the acceleration program, we decided to research more on what are the real problems Nigerian smallholder farmers face so as to provide lasting solutions in order to boost their production and income, we then realized that they lacked access to finance, quality inputs, and premium off-takers. With this, we founded Thrive Agric in 2017, an agricultural technology-enabled company that works with smallholder farmers in Nigeria to give them access to finance through linkages with institutional investors and via crowdfunding where Nigerian urban dwellers both home and abroad can fund a local farmer and get predictable returns after harvest for every farming cycle, with this Thrive Agric has been able to provide tech-enabled precision farming services, data-driven advisory and increased yield per hectare of these smallholder farmers in Nigeria and link them to premium market
Q2: How did you get into the agricultural industry? How did it happen?
Upon graduation, I traveled home to visit my parents and I decided to explore the agriculture value chain considering where I was from was an agrarian community I started a small scale farming at the back of my parent's house. In 2014, I realized that in Benue state, most farmers find it hard to link up with premium off-takers and even if they do they were not able to easily transport their goods. With this, I decided to start up a  supply chain company called Quick Leap which has now evolved into Thrive Agric.
Q3: What experience or idea inspired you to get started with Thrive Agric and what does it mean to you in today's Nigeria agricultural industry? (If you can, please attach related photos about that experience )
Today there are over 32 million smallholder farmers in Nigeria alone and it increases across Africa who occupy the bulk of the food production chain, yet Nigeria imports almost 70% of the food it consumes because the smallholder farmers are still not able to cater to the populations daily consumption not to talk of exporting their produce, due to all the difficulties they face all along the agricultural value chain; they cannot acquire quality inputs and farming technologies and are still using the old farming method.
Food insecurity is increasing by the number, today we have 46.1 million persons of the entire population food insecure, while 24.8% of the entire population is prevalent to food insecurity and the population of Nigeria is also growing massively. Nigeria is projected to increase by more than 50% in the coming two decades, and during this, its rural population is projected to increase by more than 25%, and the agricultural component is expected to grow by a slightly lower proportion, moderated by climate change and undercapitalization of the smallholder farmers.
If the agricultural sector is not well developed and farmers well equipped so as to increase their present production capacity and at the same time increased in number so as to meet the growing demand, then we are in deep trouble as a Nation. Hence, I am very much more inspired to continue the work we are doing in the agricultural space, so as to bring about food security to my lovely country as well as help in developing more tech-related solutions that would help the entire sector and boost the countries economy.
Q4: How does Thrive Agric work? How do you find farmers who want to work with you? Why do buyers fund into your farms? How can they get profitable returns back
At Thrive Agric we are very farmers centered oriented, hence all we do is to make sure our farmers are well sorted out in order to bring about more quality yield, so as to increase the profitability of both our farmers and subscribers (this are our co-farmers who fund farms).
How we do this is through backward integration, by first getting the off-takers, then the farmers, before the subscribers. We make sure that we meet and secure deals with premium off-takers in both the grain and livestock sector, after which we carry out a farmer onboarding process whereby our field agents and extension service experts go into the farming community that we are interested in, get a lead farmer who is then able to identify all farmers in that community, we then talk to the community leader who guarantees the farmers, after which our field agents collect the farmers database through our farmer onboarding app.
Our co-farmers who we get through both our crowdfunding platform and from institutional investors invest in our farmers because we give them the platform to work with farmers thereby contributing to the development of the Nation, they also get competitive ROI within a reasonable time frame of our farming cycle, they have the opportunity of rolling over, as our co-farmers they get regular updates through their mobile devices, and have the opportunity of visiting their farms if  they want to.
Our co-farmers get profitable returns back through their bank account before any farm is funded they see their ROI through our platform www.thriveagric.com and it easy for them to know their exact date of return and what amount to expect.
Q5: What are your thoughts on the current state of online funding investment in farms and agriculture industry in Nigeria? Why should buyers and investors give funds via your platform?
We think we have been able to figure out the key things, provide visibility of the farmers and their processes, provide the extension services to ensure optimal productivity , insurance against losses and a ready market for the produce.
Q6: How did you find your co-founder (s) and employees? What's the story on how you setup your team? (please attach some team photos and co-founders photos)
I and my co-founder Ayodeji Arikawe have known each other since our first year in the university as we were both studying for our undergraduate degree courses, he is a tech enthusiast and very intelligent person, we have been doing business dealings together and have co-founded a company before Thrive Agric as I have previously stated.
My awesome A-Team (Employees) are enthusiasts of agriculture as regards technology, development, and empowerment. We find our teammate mostly through referrals and job advert placement. Most of our teammates have been with us before we even registered Thrive Agric as a company and because they believe in the vision of the company.
Q7: When you guys began to build this startup, What were the difficulties your team faced and how did you guys fix them?
We had difficulty getting the right people to join the team and had to rely heavily on referrals. We also needed to gain credibility to investors and did this by sharing regular updates.
Q8: How did you get the initial money you used to start your business? Did you raise some investment from some angel investors like other companies?
We started the company through individual funds and was able to raise our first seed capital from Ventures Platform in 2017.
Q9: How did you attract new users to your platform and scale your business? How do you find more co-farmers to use your platform? What are the useful and practical operation methods you can share?
We can proudly state that we have spent less than $100 on advertisements, most of our new users are gotten through referrals, our platform has been scaled through our social media platform, all thanks to the companies growth team. The company has scaled from inception to date by being goal oriented driven, whatever target we set we make sure we work hard to hit the target, we started with just 100 farmers and in 18 months we are working with 17,000 farmers and by the end of 2019 we would be working with 35,000 farmers and we plan to scale up to 1 million farmers in 3 years.
Our operational method is to make sure that the Operations team are well equipped, all our field agents are gotten from the community we farm this way we are also creating job opportunities for the youths of the community we work with, thereby creating accountability and easy process.
Q10: How can you secure your farmers are reliable and trustworthy? Would investors lose their money and get nothing possibly? How to avoid this happen? Can you recommend one successful fund investing examples from your website? What is the link of it? (If you can, please attach related photos about these )
Our farmers onboarding process is very thorough, because we want to make sure we get the right farmers, who are accountable and trustworthy. We make sure that we get a lead farmer in the community who then get other farmers that he or she can vouch for, these farmers are then verified by the community leader and their data collected. All the farmers are then put in a cooperative where everyone is accountable for each other, we make sure that their farms are not more than 5 kilometers away from each other and all the inputs and services are given at the same time and harvest is done at the same time.
We make sure that our farmers receive weather update and also extension services through SMS as a preventive measure. In all this, we still make sure all our farms are insured and our co-farmers are guaranteed their capital in case of anything. So far, all our funding opportunities have been successful and we have paid over 16 cycles.
Q11: Have you experienced startup failures before? If YES, what did you learn from it?
Yes , in our earliest days, we had people on the team who didn't fit into startup culture and felt guilty about trying to let them go. We then realized that by keeping them we were holding on to their growth. Also and just really learnt to hire quick and fire quick.
Q12: How did you grow your revenue? What's the story behind how you got your first revenue from clients?
Our very first clients where our close friends and family members, we pitched the idea to them and told them how much profit they would get and due to the act that they believed in us, they invested their money and that's how we bought our very first good and sent to Lagos for our first Royal Exchange, with this we got accepted into Ventures Platform acceleration program who then gave us our seed fund in which we used to start working with farmers.
Q13: What operational data can you share? Your user amounts, revenues, employee numbers, etc.
In just 19 months, Thrive Agric has worked with over 17,000 smallholder farmers on majorly crops and livestock production who indirectly employ at least 3 people to work with them across 13 States in Nigeria, have reared 2 million poultry birds being the largest poultry farm in the country, this operation has been funded by over 5,000 subscribers, and on average have increased their yield threefold as a result. And our team comprises of 25 fully employed staff.
Q14: What advice do you have for newcomers who want to get into agriculture?
I would encourage everyone to go into the agriculture space, the space comprises of different sectors, its not only about farming of crops, we have different aspects of farming such as horticulture, livestock rearing(poultry and ruminant), micro livestock (snail, grasscutter etc), fish farming, vegetable farming etc. And in the agricultural value chain you could go into transportation, processing, buying from farmers and selling to processing companies, selling of inputs etc.
So my advice to any newcomer is to make sure they start small and smart, do not expect to make it immediately, be ready for failure and disappointment, but make sure you get back on your fit, correct your mistakes and start again. Insure your farms, read and learn new ways to do what you want to do effectively, get a mentor, and make sure you get the of-taker buy in before starting the business.
Q15: What's your goals for your business? Why are the goals important to you?
Our long term goal is to have on-boarded close to 10 million farmers in the next 6 years, a million farmers in 3 years, rear 10 million poultry birds in 3 years time, be the number one go to agricultural technology in the agricultural space of Africa, help Nigeria and Africa as a whole attain food security and SDG Goal 1 by 2030, be the number 1 agricultural exporting company in Nigeria, expand to other African countries, improve the agricultural value chain in Nigeria and some parts of Africa by 50% and overall aid in the affordability of quality food for all in Nigeria and most parts of Africa.
This is very important to us because we want to build an Africa that feeds itself and the world, thereby curbing unemployment, malnutrition, underdevelopment, and achieving the Sustainable Development Goal 2 (End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture).
Q16: How do you keep learning? Where do you go to learn more?
I learn from my mentors, experts with long term experience in the space, business experts in the space, online courses, acceleration and incubation programs and most importantly I read a lot and learn from doing (personal experience)
Q17: What do you do on a daily or weekly basis that you think is important in terms of forming your opinions on the agriculture space or sector?
On a daily and weekly basis I make sure I read on the improved ways of doing agriculture, I go to visit my farms in different states of the nation, I have meetings with experts in the space, I watch videos on agriculture, and or the past 2-3 months I have been learning from experts within and outside the country.
Q18: What's your biggest surprise over the last three or four years in the agricultural industry where you have been working? What happened that you didn't expect?
My biggest surprise was farmers orientation and mindset, most Nigerian farmers have the sense of entitlement and are used to a particular archaic mindset on how to farm, what to expect from loaners, and not wanting to pay back loans. But we are here to change the narrative to a better one and we are already doing so.
Q19: What's your plan for your business in the next few months? What's your business roadmap for next year?
By the end of 2019 we plan to have worked with 35,000 smallholder farmers and reared 3 million poultry birds
Q20: Where can we get more official info about you and your company?
Please visit our website www.thriveagric.com
Read about us on;
Business Day (http://www.businessdayonline.c ... ture/ ),
Quartz (http://disrupt-africa.com/2018 ... ward/ ),
Techpoint (https://techpoint.africa/2018/ ... africa) ,
Techcrunch (https://techcrunch.com/2019/03 ... o-day/) ,
and Disrupt Africa (http://disrupt-africa.com/2018 ... rmers/) .
Read online Articles on the CEO Uka Eje;
https://www.bellanaija.com/201 ... rity/
https://techmoran.com/2018/03/ ... gric/
https://www.theafricaceoforum. ... /eje/
https://innovation-village.com ... gric/
https://www.theafricaceoforum. ... /eje/
