FarmConnect

In Nigeria, more than 45 million people live on less than US$ 1.25 a day and depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. This high proportion of population exposed to the vagaries of weather patterns that have ruinous consequences on their livelihoods.

Historically, federal government of Nigeria have been unreliable partners with risk financing corporations in helping to design insurance products that will help farmers mitigate risks associated with climate change, and risk-management solutions from these corporations and other private sector have either been unavailable, Inaccessable, inadequate or too expensive.

Aside from these challenges, the financial difficulties experience by farmers especially smallholder farmers after a bad crop year also weakens farmers’ ability to buy farm inputs required to maximize their crop yields and profitability.

FarmConnect aims to provide risk management solutions for smallholder farmers through bundling farm input credit with micro-insurance for climate resilient food system.

Agriculture in Nigeria is a critical branch of the economy, providing livelihood for a high proportion of the population (nearly 64% of the population), while the sector is predominantly made up of smallholder farmers who produce over 70% of the nation's food. However, the sector has been affected drastically by climate change. In fact, direct effects of climate change on agriculture in Nigeria include fluctuations in rainfall and variable temperatures, altering growing seasons, changes in planting and harvesting calendars, and difficulties in water availability, among others. The vulnerability to climate-related shocks made more frequent and intense by climate change  is a constant threat to Nigerian agriculture to secure enough nutritious food throughout the year.

In the face of these challenges, conventional risk management companies are unwilling to extend insurance products to the agricultural sector due to natural disaster without risk-mitigating measures while the index-based agricultural insurance companies are either been Inaccessable, inadequate or unaffordable for the smallholder farmers in Nigeria.

Our solution is designed to be a result-based implementation that entails four pillars;

First,  allow smallholder farmers have access to drought-tolerant (DT) crop varieties (seeds).  High value seeds, multiple-stress-tolerant crop varieties will enable smallholder farmers in turn to have a better adaptation to the changing climates.

Second, agro-input supplies is linked to credit. This credit is designed for smallholder farmers who wish to grow crops using improved inputs, thus the credit has to cover seed or mineral fertilizer and Agro-chemical. Farmers  will purchase this package with insurance premium during the planting season to start coverage against drought and help them to pay back credit at harvest. 

Third, we offer reimbursement to farmers who suffer loss in the event of dry spells during the planting season. In this case we compensate farmers with exact value of insured inputs. This is only available for seeds during planting season.

Finally, we act as an intermediary between insurance companies and smallholder farmers. We help farmers to facilitate affordable and accessible agricultural insurance that will help them mitigate the effects of climate-related shocks and protecting them against catastrophic losses. The solution design also provides execution of agricultural index insurance products, technical support and risk monitoring.

Our solution is deliberately targeted at smallholder farmers in Ogun state Nigeria. Ogun state is predominantly known to be agrarian state due to its vast areas of arable and pasture land and its closeness to other west Africa countries. Smallholder farmers are considered to be underserved and uninsurable due to a combination of poverty, lack of education, and remoteness. These farmers have no access to financial services due to high administrative costs of extending such services to their locations. The  prominent local governments known for agriculture including ifo, Owode, Odeda, Yewa North, Ipokia etc are completely marginalized and disadvantaged local government areas. To respond to the plight of these local areas, we are piloting our service /product with farm input credit and reimbursement plan targeting 10,000 farmers to prove our solution uptake and sustainability. The reimbursement plan is purposefully only one component of a larger risk management system which includes risk reduction through input replacement in the event of climate damage, better agronomic practices, while input credit is taking a dimension of  prudent risk taking by access credit, and improved risk reserves through access to savings.

Objectively, farmer education and capacity development has been a key component of this solution because the ability of farmers to understand and discuss the product being offered is an important method of building demand. We shall be partnering with local organizations, NGOs, communities associations/groups and cooperative that already built trust and capacity within the agrarian local governments will be an instrumental for successful scale-up of our solution.

Education also plays a large role in insurance market where the similar  project reported successful use of insurance simulation games, educational videos, radio programmes, plays and cartoon strips as educational tools showed that a significant factor in a farmer’s willingness to buy the agricultural insurance plan. Though, this has been previously deployed in our extension services to display better agronomic practices, which we would re-design to tailor into our partners insurance products.

In addition, while we connect farmers with index insurance products, we shall also leverage the expertise of our partner (insurers) network to implement this new and innovative solutions. It will be supported by mobile phone service provider to enable reach many thousands of remote farmers while maintaining low delivery costs.

Climate change has revealed many vulnerability in local food system in which smallholder farmers play a critical role. In Ogun state Nigeria, they have suffered million of losses from dry spells, herdsmen and farmers clashes that arise from drought, lack of access to risk financing products and services. In term of finance services, they are underserved due to the high cost of extending financial services to these rural and remote areas. To respond to these immediate challenges, our solution provides agricultural support through risk financing products to smallholder farmers to better protect them against different kinds of weather shocks.

Dehmis Global Services is a Nigerian registered Agro-based service enterprise providing a full package of services including agriculture extension services, training, crop management and post-production management in order help smallholder farmers to increase productivity and income. We have developed a business Innovation under a brand name called FarmConnect.

FarmConnect is an initiative of Dehmis Global Services to provide risk management solutions for smallholder farmers through bundling farm input credit with micro-insurance products.

The rationale behind deploying this solution is the fact that traditional financial and insurance market have largely failed to meet smallholder Nigerian farmers' demand for affordable financial and insurance products.

However, we intend to test these new products with our paid customers who  we are currently serving. We believe the vision to grow bigger and attract more farmers with innovative products.

When we trying to differentiate our solution from the competition that addressing the same problem, our solution is much more advanced, effective, and impact-driven.

There are several similar businesses that are selling farm inputs in big pack sizes which are majorly located in urban areas but a few of them are concentrated in rural areas, our solution is not only concentrated where the solution is needed  but offering products that are drought-tolerant (DT). This will help to combat climatic variabilities, diseases, and pests because high value seeds, multiple-stress-tolerant crop varieties will enable smallholder farmers in turn to have a better adaptation to the changing climates. However, we have also developed an innovative financial solution that enables farmers to access input on credit. Access to affordable agricultural credit at the start of the season is essential for farmers to purchase improved seed, fertilizer, crop protection and other production inputs. We bundle this financial products with micro-insurance products (reimbursement plan), which enables farmers get protected against severe weather events that directly affects crop germination and growth.

In addition, our solution facilitates accessible and affordable agricultural insurance that will help farmers mitigate the effects of climate-related shocks and protecting them against catastrophic losses. This also provides execution of agricultural index insurance products, technical support and risk monitoring.

Our solution is an innovative and comprehensive agriculture model that seeks to sustainably improve the lives of smallholder farmers through the provision of end-to-end farming services.

As of May 2021, Dehmis Global Services have able to offer a wide range of training and advisory services.The direct training approach involves in-person trainings at cooperatives and farmer groups such as AFAN (A national farmers association which brings together small holder farmers from all state of Nigeria), while the indirect approach involves workshops to train TOTs of stakeholders, audio and SMS messaging.

However, we have successfully tested these services and we are able to make positive impact. This has helped to record our brand in the minds of smallholder farmers we are serving. We believe the vision to grow bigger and attract more farmers with innovative products. We have developed a business innovation under a brand name called FarmConnect.

FarmConnect is an initiative of Dehmis Global Services to provide risk management solutions for smallholder farmers. 

Next Steps

Our goal is to impact 200,000 to 500,000 smallholder farmers in rural area in Nigeria within the next 10 years, by providing risk management solutions that will protect their crops and livelihoods. This project aims to offer credit facility on farm input and link smallholder farmers to local insurers and other stakeholders in the agricultural insurance value chain. FarmConnect aims to work with multiple partners in the agriculture and insurance value chain of Nigeria.

 By the end of the pilots project within a year, the project expects to have reached approximately 10,000 smallholder farmers in Ogun state, Nigeria.

Dehmis Global Services is currently run by managing director who is also chief executive officer. He implements the organisation's mission with a more hands-on approach to administrative functions.

To date, we have;

2 permanent employees each earning middle wage salaries
3 contract staffs

We also plan to hire more staffs

We have a dedicated team members with a wide range of experience

TEAM


Name: Adeniyi Israel Ademola

Role: Founder

Responsibilities: Oversees the whole venture operation involving in strategic planning, business development and marketing scheme for sales of agricultural inputs.



Education: MSc in Business and Applied Economics



Background: Adeniyi Israel Ademola is a master degree holder in Business and Applied Economic. He is an entrepreneur with over 5 years experience working in business management especially in Agro-related activities. He is a trained Agro-extension officer making information and advisory services accessible to small holder farmers in Lagos, Nigeria. He is a passionate and impact-driven person who is making positive change within existing food and value chains and contribute to food security in Nigeria


Name: Muhammad Mubarak Olajide

Role: Director of field operations

Responsibilities: Responsible for a comprehensive set of services including soil managenment, advisory services, training and market facilitation.

Education: Bsc in Agricultural Economics and Extension


Background: Muhammad Mubarak Olajide has a strong background and interest in agriculture, environment, social entrepreneurship, and SME development. Working at the grass-root level, he has worked as a field assistant for agriculture-based company, an extension officer for Lagos state Agricultural Development Authority. Holding a bachelor's degree in Agricultural Economics and Extension.


Name: Adekoya Oladapo

Role: Quality control/logistics specialist

Responsibilities: Responsible for purchasing and procurement services.



Education: B.Agric (Agricultural Administration)


Background: Adekoya Oladapo is a recognised expert in inclusive supply chain solutions. He has worked in several companies generating private sector investments and transforming agriculture value chains.