EAST AFRICA FRUITS Farm & Co Ltd

EAST AFRICA FRUITS Farm & Co Ltd

PENDING CONTRACTING: the investment proposal has received final approval and now is entering into the contracting phase. This disclosure is made pursuant our disclosure policy and will remain on line during 30 days, after which it will be removed automatically.

Investment Name: EAST AFRICA FRUITS Farm & Co Ltd

Publication date: 25 March 2021

Region: Africa

Country: Tanzania

Sector: Horticulture and rice

Website: https://www.eafruits.com/

Total AgriFI Financing: Equivalent in EUR of maximum 1.5 m USD (~1.3 m €)

Environmental and Social Category: B

(A) high risk, (B+) medium high risk, (B) medium risk or (C) low risk

Project overview:

Founded in 2013 by Elia Timotheo, a Tanzanian social entrepreneur, East Africa Fruits (EAF) is a family business collecting a range of fresh produce directly from smallholder farmers and distributing them to urban customers in Dar Es Salaam. The company focuses on tackling post-harvest losses by aggregating supply & demand and improving the overall cold chain distribution, processing & warehousing infrastructure, while increasing the availability and quality of produce in the local markets.

EAF currently sources from a 2,000+ network of smallholders and provides them additional support to accelerate their financial inclusion. They link farmers across the country to hundreds of informal market vendors, but also to hotels, restaurants and supermarkets in Tanzania’s largest city and economic hub. By going from farm to urban marketplaces, EAF is replacing multiple intermediaries and therefore reducing food waste along the chain, maintaining control over the produce quality and ultimately redistributing more of the final price back to smallholders.

The company completed a 1.6 m USD equity round in 2020, led by Goodwell Investments and with the participation of FINCA Ventures and Elea. With an increasing demand and a large untapped market ahead, EAF aims at scaling up and plans to serve 10,000 farmers by 2025.

Funding objective and impact:

AgriFI funding aims to support the company’s activities scale up: financing additional trucks, collection centres and machinery while providing working capital to keep sourcing from more farmers.

Why AgriFI wants to fund this project:

  • 100% outgrower model with retribution of value towards smallholders
  • Reinforcement of domestic value chain & food security, tackling a structural issue of post-harvest losses
  • Highly scalable model

Environmental and social rationale:

The transaction has been categorised as B in accordance with EDFI MC E&S Policy. The potential environmental and social impacts associated with the company operations (from collection to basic processing and distribution towards urban customers in Dar es Salaam) are site specific, identified and addressed through appropriate mitigation and management measures.

 

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