IDO-TI

The livestock industry is plagued with sharp increase in the cost of feed which is fueled by competing use demands for corn and soybeans and by rising energy prices. This have affected the beef, pork, dairy, and poultry industries. In contrast, wholesale prices for most animal products have held steady causing a lot of farmer to close down their farm or reduce their scale of production.

One-third (31.5 million tons) of the world’s ocean fish catch is turned into fish meal and ground up for animal feed, a potential problem for marine ecosystems and a waste of a resource that could directly nourish humans. Aside from the potential ecological consequences, the taking of these large numbers of forage fish interferes with food security for humans.

Our Growing populations need more food, but we can't afford to strip any more of the world's resources to grow it. Agricultural areas will need to expand considerably if we are to feed the growing, and increasingly affluent, global population. In our urgency to produce more fish meal, some farming methods are stripping nutrients from the soil, fueling climate change and driving biodiversity loss. We also risk undermining future generations' chances to grow food.

Yet, there is a way we could increase the amount of food we produce without having to create any more farmland, grow any more crops or rear more animals.

Cities of low and middle-income countries face severe challenges in managing the increasing amount of waste produced, especially the organic fraction. Every year, an estimated 1.2 billion tonnes of food is wasted. Currently, 2.8 billion tonnes of organic waste is created in urban centres but less than 2% of it is captured and used again. Discarded produce, byproducts and sewage are all full of nutrients that could be harnessed to grow new food or create biomaterials. Could something be done with these materials? Black Soldier Fly (BSF) bio waste treatment is an attractive treatment option as it offers a solution for waste management while also providing a protein source to help alleviate the rising global demand for animal feed.

IDO-TI is a waste to value company using climate smart innovation to tackle global issues such as waste management, demand for protein, climate smart energy demand and environmental conservation. We recycle/convert food and organic waste to nutritious and high protein dense biomass as feeds for aquaculture and other livestock, organic fertilizer and briquettes. Our Services/Products are in three major segment, which includes;

• Sensitization and Waste collection at household level: We are Promoting the effective waste management principles at household, schools, restaurant and fruit market level by sensitizing on the need to segregate their waste into organic/food waste and other waste This reduces the waste that goes into landfill making it cheaper and better for people and the environment. The food waste segregated at household, schools, restaurant and fruit market is collected by our staff/empowered waste pickers. This is further sorted at the farm level and used as feed to young larva of Black Soldier fly (BSF). Other waste (Plastics, Pet bottles, Nylons, and Cartons) are sold out to recyclers.
• The matured BSF larva are harvested, dried, processed and pelletized to a nutritious and high protein dense biomass as feeds for aquaculture and other livestock.
• Our decomposed waste is used as Organic Fertilizer and briquettes.

Our target market includes Farmers (both Crop and Livestock Farmers) and Households in low cost and undeserved community. 75% of working Nigerians in this community make all or part of their living by farming, including some 800,000 smallholder farmers. Currently, 46% of the population live on less than 1 U.S. dollar a day, 36.5% are food insecure and 35 percent of children under five are chronically malnourished.

As the population is growing at very high rates food demand is rising accordingly. It is a general knowledge in the Livestock industry that feed is the single highest cost item in livestock production. Market reveals that it constitutes 70% - 80% of total cost of production in any livestock enterprise. In 2020, the price of fish feed increased with about 80% without a commensurate increase in price of fish sold per kg. This made a lot of farmers including me lose money and eventually shut down fish production.

 With an increase in demand from animal feed industry for alternative proteins due to rise in prices of foreign feeds, the preference of black soldier fly market is expected to reach $500,000 by meeting the need of about 400 livestock farmers in our community.

Our solution is a path to improving household incomes with a readily available resource, and that is really exciting,”

IDOTI is a team of Seven (7) and 10 Volunteers working tirelessly on this Project. Each team players is vast in their area of expertise in Agricultural industry.

The team lead is a Sustainable Development practitioner with expertise in management of Integrated Systems, Research and Development. He has undergone studies and practical knowledge on Technology adoption and it's effect on Small holder farmers in Southwest region, Nigeria. He is well vast in agro-ecology and integrated system of farming having undergone a six month training in Songhai Leadership Academy Portonovo. He has work as a farm manager, program manager for an agricultural NGO and He is a consultant with international institute of Agriculture. He is very passionate about building the capacity of farmers especially women and youth in low and undeserved communities.

Through our commitment with our community during sensitization on waste Management and BSF Training, We discovered that there is a large pool of potential consumers and significant need especially important among farmers, along with global economies, struggle to recover from the financial impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, including food shortages. Our research indicate about 90 percent of farmers and 85 percent of feed producers in Nigeria are ready to use our Bio-Feed. The annual supply of dried BSF larvae for feed formulation in Nigeria is about 3,600 metric tons, but IDOTI estimates the current demand at about 90,000 metric tons. So far, IDOTI has Sensitize over 30 households on waste segregation at household level, trained more than 300 farmers across Ondo state on how to raise and use BSF as feed supplements. Our prototype has been tested in our poultry and fish farm, the egg production was increased by 20% more than the conventional feed, with fish attaining 350grms within 8weeks.

If shortlisted, We look forward to gain a world class mentor-ship, training and entrepreneur’s network in the global space. We want to be able to run a sustainable waste management project and with that we will need help on our business model and also partnership that will help us scale up.  However, to scale up our project and to meet the pressing need of our community, IDOTI requires a lot of inputs and resources, we are in need of some crucial things for market penetration.

• BSF Bio-Pond Facility.
• Logistics for waste Collection.
• Drying and pelletizing Equipment’s.
• Packaging Equipment’s.

The present waste collection system in our community does not give room for flexibility and Education on waste management which has cause a lot of challenges in collection and sorting. More than 90% of the waste collected goes to landfill which produces green house gas emission and contributes to global climate change. 

IDOTI has come up with a Sensitization techniques at household level as well as the the community level on waste segregation and reuse.

Our Tech-based Solutions includes;

• Tech Based (Mobile and Web) Onboarding Farmers on our platform(for training and Commerce)
• Use of USSD e.g *394*26# for waste collection at house hold level.     
• Food waste app (Collections of Sorted food waste and Converting it to wealth)

Within the next 2-5 years, IDOTI intends to have expanded to our four more states in Nigeria, namely, Ogun, Oyo, Osun and Ondo, gaining more market traction and market share, improve on our market base.

Train over 10,000 women and Youth using the BSF technology, Increase the production of feed to 1000 tonnes per year. Establishment of waste pickup centres in the local government within the states. Employment of both full-time and part-time staff as a result of our expansion to other states, and this will, in turn, generate a revenue of over Four million naira on a quarterly basis for the period of five years.

On our Sales and Marketing Plan, Our approach to produce highly nutritious animal feed by leveraging on natures recycling will be achieved by:

• Free sensitization on segregation of waste at households, Schools and solid waste management (SWM) services.
• We will also gain market presence via our awareness on our social media platforms and website.
• Establishing contact with Agricultural traders and company that can become our customers
• Promote our business on Agricultural platforms.
• Referrals will be used as our major mode of marketing our product.

Since inception, we have recorded geometric increase in our egg production on site. We have expanded our Love cage from a single cage to a building that can accommodate over 50,000 BSF fliers at once. IDOTI has Sensitize over 30 households on waste segregation at household level, trained more than 300 farmers across Ondo state on how to raise and use BSF as feed supplements. We produce our BIO_FEED product that has been tested in our poultry and fish farm as well as our neighboring farms in our community, the egg production increased by 20% more than the conventional feed, with fish attaining 350grms within 8weeks. 

While we are using the Application of Science and Evidence based Knowledge to tackle most pressing Global challenges and also advocating for a Clean Environment and the well-being our the citizenry, IDOTI is having more impact on the livestock industry, and directly impact the live of the farmers in Nigeria. The increase in the cost of feeds has affected the livestock industries,  which has caused a lot of farmer to close down their farm or reduce their scale of production. IDOTI has come to resuscitate the faith of the farmers and keep them in the business this will in turn improve the economic and reduces the poverty level of the people especially in low cost and undeserved community.

The present waste collection system in our community does not give room for waste management education and more than 90 % of the waste collected goes to landfill which produces green house gas emission and contributes to global climate change.

Our solution has the ability to make the communities in which we work change their perspective about waste and how to manage it properly. This will contribute to clean environment and make our communities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.

Black fly soldier’s technology is an environmentally friendly and effective approach for degrading organic wastes. It transforms organic waste into high-value eco-friendly entities such as high protein biomass and organic fertilizer. These products will go a long way to ease the burden of feeding livestock for livestock farmers and also help crop farmers produce foods in a sustainable way which is friendly to humans and the environment.

Most of our trainings are targeted towards the less priviledged in the low cost and undeserved community where they have access to the same opportunity as for the people in the urban areas. The ratio of Men to women in selecting the beneficiary is 3:5. More focus is on the women because our solution does not required much energy before you can own a BSF site. 

What we do after training is to setup a BSF farm in a community where the farmers can access, we also provide BSF eggs for them to start operation on the farm. Our monitoring team will be there at intervals in all the production stages to provide mentorship and evaluation. After a successful cycle of Production. We encouraged the farmers by buying eggs and Larva from them to produce Livestock Feeds in our factory.

There is a high demand in our BIO-FEED due to the rise in prices of foreign feeds. With the increase in demand for animal feed and alternative proteins, the preference of black soldier fly market gives us an edge. 

For sustainability, our revenue will be generated through the sales of;

-BSF larva,

-Pelletized Bio-feed,

-Black soldier fly egg

-Bio-fertilizer and

-Training.

Our products price is as follows; BSF larva - $0.36/kg, N150/kg; Pelletized feed – $0.49/kg, N200/kg; BSF egg – $2.43/g, N1000/g, bio-fertilizer $0.24/kg, N100/kg

So far, we have received support from ACCENT BUSINESS ACADEMY on Business Coaching for 6 month. Alongside our personal investment/Capital from the team, we also receive fund from Reconciliation House, a Christian body who is so interested in our commitment and work on environment and waste reuse. Aside from our revenue model slated above, We have successfully generate maximum income from the sales of our fish produced from our Bio-feeds and livestock reared on our farm that are directly feeding on our bio-feed product.