inua mycotile

 Inua mycotile collect waste hay and other crop dry waste from rural farmers which we use to grow mycelium as panels which are then treated and pressed to form boards

Inua mycotile is offering affordable&decent housing to the local poor population in kenya while helping tackle increasing challenge of crop waste mismanagement that leads to increased disease outbreaks . Working from kenya wheat/rice growing region, fungal rust is a common problem, most farmers result in pilling wheat/rice straws after harvest which makes it easy for disease to spill over to the next season, alternatively, these are burned down on farm bringing lots of negative effect. Inua mycotile collect straw&other crop dry waste from rural farmers which we use to grow mycelium as panel. These panel are then treated&pressed to form boards used in house ceiling, rooms subdivision ,door and furniture making on custom orders. Our boards are cheaper when compared to wood based boards, environmentally friendly to make , lighter and custom sized making it easy and cheap while building. From our pilot products we have established that our product are fire retardant thus fits in rural and slum upgrading where house fire are common , they are acoustic and fit office subdivision as they are noise prove. Our r&D Is finalizing boards fused with life long mosquito retardant biochar to ensure house made with our boards are malaria free. 

Crop waste( unused crop straws) is a big problem in Kenya wheat and rice growing regions, with the remain parts after harvest being less palatable to animals , they are mostly piled on end of farms to rot or be burned(80%) while on farm, these leads to losses from all angles from soil degradation to environmental pollution. In a country where rain seasons are becoming shorter, dams are built upstream to conserve water, farmer in middle and lowlands are suffering from increased invasion of swamp vegetations like reeds and tryna which are menace with no commercial value. 2015 kenya government started ambitious affordable housing program, banned tree felling which made the overall cost of ceiling ,partitioning boards and building panel boards to extreme high for local youths. Importation or low stardardard hazardious synthetic boards increased amidst supply gap. We are working to solve crop waste problem while bridging the supply gap of building boards and panel through our innovation works. With a sister company that have made and is making stabilized soil and crop waste building blocks for housing skeleton will are making finishing cheaper , quality and healthy.

60% of 40 million Kenyan population are youths, 80% are unemployed while of these 70% lives in rural villages and rental slums areas, as a culture, most of them are geared to marriage and housing that  one own is a critical need  based on African culture. Most of these youths are pushed to construct non decent mud wall ,paper ceiling housing that is risky in all aspect from snake and insect invasion to flooding demolition and cold resultant diseases. We are working in Nyandarua and NAM akuru county with a combine male youth population of 500000. Banking on our local roots we aim to serve 25% of these population in supply of construction boards,panel and doors in our 1st scale before scaling to target 30  middle class real estate builders(companies doing houses on behalf of clients) 5 of whom have tested our mvp in their new model house. Our aim is to serve construction company and work with young civil engineers who recommend material to clients whom they design and build for.

with government ambition to build 2 million affordable housing in Kenya, population on continuous increase,our aim is to capture 10% of ceiling board market, 5% of custom furniture(school furniture) market in 5 years. Scaling to serve east Africa in medium term in b-2-b model where we make boards for real estate companies and furniture makers .

I am a co founder of Inua Uwezo Builders company,social venture that for the past 3 years have being building affordable  and decent housing for rural population using locally available sustainable material and technology to reduce carbon footprint as well as environmental degradation that accompany traditional mud house construction in rural Kenya.

Having being the lead researcher in these company, we were able to develop a low cost mobile interlocking block making machine that is able to make 1500 blocks per day using just 2 litres of diesel and work force of 3 ( any gender as its hydraulic system).We trained locals to make houses through these blocks and 24 houses were constructed from may 2019 to June 2020. Its during finishing of these houses that we discovered the need to have sustainable ceiling, partitioning boards,door panel and single use furniture as what was available  in market compromised our value proportion.

we started research in December 2019,had the first mvp in April 2020&commercially produced for our housing need in June 2020,we teamed up with a student group of civil and construction engineers interning in 5 different real estate companies who run pilots on desirability and quality approval of our product which so far has being positive.

our r&d team is back to lab based on responses from the slum and rural village upgrading venture interested in our product to check on possibility of infusing,slow release mosquito repellant biochar to ensure the house made from our boards are forever malaria free

We had developed an initial mvp which was tested in market,first by our sister company and then by 5 real estate companies. we have gotten their views on what need to be improved to make our product  perfect fits and suggestions that will improve the value we offer to market and the community.

we are back in lab to collect the highlighted mistakes and soon we shall be in market to re pilot again before setting out to commercial production

Using plant waste to grow mushroom have being in application for centuries, scientifically, it occurs naturally in nature.

However,for the last one decade, the focus have changed and crop waste are being used to grow mycelium panel(mushroom root fibres networks) rather than mushrooms.These panel have had various application with ecovative design in USA leading in industry in furniture ,housing and even coffin production.We are banking on these technology  to  offer our solution.

Unlike ecovative and other players in Europe ,In Africa , there is less if any application of mycelium boards if any. We work in these isolated filled combining both scientific technology with social innovation to offer our solution.While others focus on product sales, we focus both on product and production landscape to ensure our sourcing of raw material, production and products produced have sustainable, economic and circular values to the population around.

To make the next generation of construction boards, based on reviews and requests from our target customers, we are incorporating ,insect physiology and behavior science as well as biochemical fusion of insect retardant phytochemicals from plant extract(biochar)  technologies to ensure what we make fits the exact market need in market .

so far our mvp product (construction boards )have being used in 25 houses, with mycoboards furniture awaiting test in county kindergarten. 

upon approval , we target to serve atleast 10% of 100000 units of houses build for low and middle class population who have affordability as key determinant of what they buy.

we aim to work with county early child education department and supply at least 50 kindergarten schools with sample chairs and tables  .

Wheat straw as most dry crop waste and cleared invansive swamp vegetation are mostly set on fire in a bid to eliminate them.these plactice apart from causing a lot of air pollution through smoke ad fumes lead to destruction of soil integrity, nutritional value and biodiversity loss. In kenya , 4 years ago , government opened a robust affordable housing project with projection of 100,000 houses amidst prevailing tree felling restriction, the demand and cost of building boards increased with increased importation of synthetic wood ,plastic made and gypsum boards which leads to lots of carbon credit importation. Most boards aren’t fit for use in housing set up due to their chemical make-up. Our work prevent crop waste burning which is not environmentally friendly or stacking to reduce the cases of diseases re-outbreaks. We reduced the need to fell more trees for boards making as well importation of boards make in non environmentally safe ways or products. 

In the next 1 year, our aim is to eliminate burning or farm stacking of all waste wheat straws by 1000 farmers in Gilgil subcounty, making  mycoboards ceilings  for at least 1000 houses and setting these as a model county for green house construction in kenya.

We aim to work extensively on sdgs 1: no poverty as local farmers gets to sell their waste to us through aggregators for extra coins, those around swamps and swampy vegetation invested areas can harvest and dry reeds and other grassy vegetation for us to buy. 

Sdg 12: responsible production and consumption: Mycoboards aim to replace tree based boards and imported non sustainable synthetic boards whose manufacturing and importation leads to increased environmental degradation. Through custom manufacturing, we ensure we produce what is used to fit and less waste is generated. where waste is inevitable, we direct our waste to inua uwezo builders who use these to make building blocks for house skeletom 

Sdg13 climate action: Green board, eliminating carbon credits in manufacturing as well as expensive tree felling cost on environment 

Sdg 11: sustainable cities, through design of decent and affordable housing materials that at endlife has zero pollution effect to the cities and planet.

As a company, we measure our impact based on number of waste straws turned into mycoboards,number of ceiling and construction panel sold as well as extra income generated to the local population involved  aggregation of waste straws.

Finances to set up a commercial structure.

Government approval as construction is a sensitive field in Kenya,

John mwaniki: c.e.o and founder of the venture, mechanical engineer in training, trained social entrepreneur and former co founder of inua uwezo builder, a social venture that design and construct affordable housing main skeleton using locally available soil that are made into ssbs in our own designed machine.inua mycotile is a break up sister company that concentrate in finishing boards and As the chief innovator am leading product design . 

Kennedy kamau: civil and construction engineer and quality control in our company, with housing background, ken helps in designing product to customer fits and helps in quality control of newly developed products during test phase

 Nathaniel muiru: civil and construction engineer and co founder in inua uwezo builder As an expert in house design he is the link between us and the clients, us and customization ,us and next generation product design. Key to minute details , he helps the design team with computer simulations and test long before we make that product 

James kamau: co founder mechanical engineer in training and lead operation manager of the venture. Ygap trained social entrepreneur with 4 years of experience in business strategy development and product marketing. He brings wealth of experience in research, networks and overall business development 

Currently we are in unofficial partnership with county Government department of education who are  testing model desk and chairs for use in schools as well as local real estate companies testing our boards to see their potential applicability in construction industry .

inua mycotile employ an all women population in aggregation of crop waste.

apart from these economic empowerment program ,the social values delivered from our work benefits women and girls since they are the ones who spend most of times in houses, a decent house which is pest free helps women live better life as 70% of rural women are house wives or culture limits them to house cores alone .