Powering smart garden farming

Committed to solve hunger and poverty through agriculture projects. I call it integrated water-food value chain for sustainable smallholder agriculture in Southern Africa. 

The solution is to introduce water conserving technology that can bring good yield.Innovate an app though a mobile phone that can help communication with the individual project in a remote area.

I find power in small holder farmers when empowered with resources. They have land readily available and  have labor. When helped with resources needed they can help food security locally, nationally and even globally. Food is the solution to healthy,  hunger and poverty. These communities will work on their free land and produce to supply the markets. They can be taught hygiene. learn to package food and exported to other markets around the world. This solution of empowering communities completely changes the mind set of charity receiving hand outs but teach them to be hand up.

In Southern Africa droughts compounded by global warming now the corona virus pandemic, there is untold poverty. An average person lives on $2 per day. The unemployment is 80% of  a population of about 250,000.000 people in the region.The political leaders care little about the communities. Nothing is allocated from the treasurer to help communities. Corruption is rampant.The region of Southern Africa the main people who suffer more are  women and children. The shut down of the already dying economies is going to increase the suffering three fold. Southern Africa is in a deep hole.

Intuba is coming up with a solution to help empower these communities by introducing business like models of farming.We start by grouping and evaluating the communities. We evaluate the needs and opportunities.We introduce a concept new to the community,raised beds and bucket irrigation system. We conduct pre-survey and drill a water well. To increase production to commercial level we install solar pumping. With water we introduce livestock and source the market for groups. The groups are out of poverty and start feeding the nation. 

All Intuba needs is funding to reach and help as many communities. These become permanent money generating projects, thus a solution.

There is great potential in empowering communities with agriculture skills to increase food security for themselves and the nation.

1) Empower the community especially women and girls who are found in the remote rural area with no jobs and education. The good thing about empowering the community is they are developed  at their base. You don't make them change the culture nor the environment. These projects make them assume the ownership and they become entrepreneurs on their right.

2) Training in new technology and concepts is key to their development. We run workshops we teach drip irrigation, solar installation, pumping and maintenance.We introduce and establish this new technologies.These are technologies that are used in many parts of the world but they are however new in many rural communities in Southern Africa. We issue farmers with Certificates so they feel the sense of achievement. We monitor and evaluate each project through our trained field officers.

3) The most important thing Intuba does is the connect the remote projects with the market in larger cities. We are currently working on new innovation App that will give remote farmers more information about the markets, prices, type of soils and water levels before drilling.

Intuba works with communities mainly in the rural communities of Southern Africa. We work with peri-urban groups as well. The rural small holder farmers some has resided in these areas for over 150 years. Mostly these are like forgotten areas where there are no roads, no clean water, no close good schools, no electricity. The people have no income no employment but their little fields where they try to get food every year during the little rain seasons now because of global warming. These are our main target groups that we empower to develop them to be entrepreneurs.

Intuba Sustainable Projects reach to them, we encourage them to operate in groups not individuals. They take our projects seriously simple because we are dealing with people who are farmers already. They understand that new concepts and technology improves their old ways of same farming. We introduce new seeds with a variety of nutritious body building organic foods.We help them understand that there is need to plant commercially so they can feed themselves, the nations and globally.

Our solution is key to their sustainability. The concepts are replicated. In actual fact these communities benefit on two important things,clean water and nutritious food.

The challenge to targeted communities is simple hunger and poverty. The programs and solutions Intuba is doing now is the solution to eradicating hunger and poverty.  We are teaching  new farming concepts and new technology. Our new innovation  App and solar installation will go a long way to inform, instruct and connect these remote gardens to better life. Our solution is also targeting women and girls. Women, girls, orphans and children are Intuba's main beneficiaries of these food programs. Women form the largest membership of our 25 projects in 5 countries in Southern Africa.Our solution is  relevant to the needs.

Our app is innovative because it is a location and map based app that
helps small poor and remote farmers collect data about their projects. It
helps to connect farmer to farmer, farmer to market and farmer to donor.
networking and interaction, lastly we have tailored it to help donors and
project members implement what we call “user-based approach funding” unlike the common way that groups every project in one for funding.

The core technology is in the GPS, location and mapping process which
enables real time connection and networking of farmers and markets.
The location technology allows farmers to be located and their projects
located, managed and published. Enables donors to track projects in real
time. Also allows farmers to organize themselves and organize the
market around them, location tools enable them to implement programs
such as road stores, U-pick sale campaigns, Subscription farming
networks, small farm maps, navigate and record specific locations,
collect data, monitor garden conditions and more.

The GPS and mapping technology is already used in large commercial
farming, primarily to create farm maps with precise acreage for field
areas and navigation. Garden farmers will be able to also develop garden
maps, small scale farm maps and be able to share that information,collect data and use it to improve yields and sales.

Our integrated water-food value chain program for sustainable
development is missing one element which is the “tech innovation”. The
addition of the app will change small holder farmer’s metrics in terms of
both efficiency, maximum output and financial investment in their
projects. First change is being able to use GPS technology to create
garden maps, location technology will enable location tools like creating
road stores etc, collect data about their projects, create and share the data
across platforms.
Funding is a major issue in project start up, expansion and sustainability,
our tech innovation will increase donor funding by introducing “user-
based approach funding” a donor will see a specific project and fund just
that small project. Farmers will be trained on how to use the app through
workshops and the app does not require internet to use except when
sharing or receiving information. Our tech innovation will enable
farmers to quickly locate markets and view distance, garden mapping
will allow easy planning and surveying of potential gardens and water
wells that are closer to the water table. It will also help map water wells
and collect water output data and service. Small holder farmers can
potentially increase revenue and also be paid in foreign currency and reach outside markets by targeting their own diaspora markets.

Few of our projects in Zimbabwe did not know where to sell their
tomatoes it took a few years to find a buyer called Turn Matabeleland
Green (TMG) and it will also coordinate farmer to farmer sharing of
information and local buyers.

Our solution currently serves 6000. It will serves about 7500. In 5 years
it will serve about 23 400 depending on funding availability.
This is based on average garden owners which is usually around 25
members and village community is usually about 300 residents. We have
about 20 projects so 20 * 300 = 6000 members that we service. So
protectively each year we start 5 projects with the same rate of 25
villages we can say 5 years * 1500 that we add per year = 7500 people
additional in the next 5 years so using current average numbers total we
will serve is 13500 that’s when we add 6000 people we already serve.
Because garden start up grows in increments based on funding the
average number is average but not may not be accurate we project more
accurate estimate will be 25 000 to 35 000 people will be served in 5
years. With our tech innovation, we will be able to also project produce
out and be able measure project contributions to the economy and
market.
If we had adequate funding we would prospectively be running 10
projects in each country per year. 5 countries * 10 + 50 projects, in 5
years it would 50*5 = 250 projects in 5 years. Each project has an
average of 1000 community members so 250 *1000 people would = 250
000 village community members impacted in 5 years. Then we replicate
the same program every 5 years.

The barriers are lack of small holder and technology that is scalable to
small garden needs, running workshops we face literacy challenges in
remote areas, sourcing funding for projects we get more inquiries for
workshops and more people that want to start projects but we have
limited resources and surveying land for water well drilling sometimes
wells are drilled in garden locations and then they have to move garden
to a different location because well is dry

Sourcing of funding may affect tech development and the growth of
projects, with increased donor funding there would be an increase in
new projects and technology. The other barrier is the unstable economies
in some parts of Africa. Unstable economies usually result in low profits
and lower prices for commodities. The increase in droughts due to
global warming usually results in dry wells and massive water shortages.
The technical barrier is sometimes due to political instability it
sometimes affects donations to specific countries.

Sourcing funding will have to create more fundraising techniques and
increase applications for funding through various programs, social media
campaigns, other charity partnerships, applying for funding and grant
writing.
We advise our farmers to diversify their projects and to also develop
cash crops in case their country experiences a sudden economic change
or depression. In our workshops, we also advise seed preservation
methods and saving money in case of unforeseen financial changes.
During drought season, we encourage drought resistant crops and our
drip system irrigation technique helps mitigate large water usage.
If a certain country is facing political instability and donors are
encouraged not to send donations to that specific country we encourage
farmers to apply for domestic donations/funding and use local
fundraising community methods.

Our solution team is part of Intuba, a non profit 501(c)(3) organization registered in the USA.

Three people are working on the solution, We have no full time staff or part time staff, no contractors and other workers working on the solution at this time. The Intuba organization this app is serving has 10 local team leaders in the five Southern African countries where we operate.

Our team has been working in remote areas, in small groups and with limited
funding however we have been able to grow and impact communities using water conserving gardening methods. Our innovative approach focusing on specific needs affecting small holder farmers has feathers that will improve communication. We 

We currently have 5 active partnerships with churches in the USA.  We continue to seek partnerships with faith based organizations, foundations, and private companies. Early support for Intuba was provided by “Healing Hands International” who funded 4 water wells in Southern Africa (www.hhi.org).

Our business model there is 8 steps:
1. Evaluate community needs.
2. Organize training and workshop
3. introduce ag tech tools via app.
4. Introduce drip bucket and drip kits.
5. Conduct pre-drill survey and drill well
6. Install solar pumping.
7. Establish livestock and poultry production.                                                 8. Access markets for poultry, livestock and produce

Why are we applying: We are applying to solve because we believe small
holder farmers are facing the biggest challenge in funding and technological
research most of the new technology and research is geared towards bigger high
profit commercial farms. Solve’s focus on solutions offers an opportunity to
help us research and enable our tech solution to be a focal and enhancer to our
already working and proven 8 step model.
Which of the barriers can “solve” help us overcome: Solve can help us connect
to relevant donors to our cause, fundraising methods and help connect us to
partners who can help our tech development by helping us develop AI sensors
for monitoring ground water and mapping, this will help farmers predict water
outputs and serve also as drought indicator.
If my solution is selected : Intuba will get recognition and connection to a wide
network of other organizations and partners who share a similar cause. Intuba
will also benefit from the technical advise.

Our partnership goals are to be able to grow from a small impact organization to
be able to increase number of gardeners which will result in an increase in food
security, supply and production from community level, national level to global
level. Most of this can be archived through funding and networking.

We would like to partner with “bread for the world”, “food resource bank” and
“Bill Gates Foundation” we would like to partner with them by having them
evaluate our 8 step model and 10 000 farmers that are active and a community
of 25 000 people we would like them to look and evaluate our program at a
smaller scale and help us replicate to other communities so we can reach our
maximum potential to alleviating hunger and promoting sustainable
development.

majority of our community and project members are woman. They do
most of the work and are the voice for our projects and most of our projects
provide woman economic empowerment, our tech solution gives them a chance
to express and show case their garden project developments and economic role
in society, we have girls learning and developing interest in agriculture projects.
Most of the proceeds of sales from the garden projects provide school fees for
the families which comprise of more girls than boys.

YES. Because we are more focused on agriculture AI in small ag projects our
mapping tech and app to solve ground water mapping, dry water wells, and
water well output. The AI technology will be implemented underground sensors
that will help determine water levels and provide ground water mapping data
that can be used to determine water well outputs.