Fumbisi Agro-Farmers undertakes commercial contract production of maize, rice, soybean and sorghum. The company offers land leaseholding for its smallholder farmers who are women, and provides composting/organic farming and conservation farming practices to all its smallholder farmers. Fumbisi Agro-Farms provides key benefits to its numerous cooperative members, including donkey ploughing and transport, credit support for market linkage inputs, good agricultural practices and Farm Enterprise Advisor (FEA) services, farm demonstrations, farm clinics and field trips. The company works with 600 smallholder out-growers (30% women) in four districts. It joined the MADE programme in 2017 and aggregated 2,000 MT of maize, 5,000 MT of rice and 1,000 MT of soybean in the 2018–19 season.
MADE interventions
- Recruited, trained and deployed two FEAs and one FEA manager.
- Facilitated links between tractor and mechanisation service providers and smallholder farmers.
- Introduced cooperative savings for farmers.
- Facilitated linkages with extension services from the Ministry of Food and Agriculture for remote, underserved farmers.
- Provided demonstrations and training to smallholder farmers on compost and conservation farming practices.
- Facilitated commercial relationships with other MADE partners (Akandem Farms, Simple Prince, Noyine Maltinga and Savanna Agri Chains) for market links and farm services.
Impacts
- Increased smallholder outreach from 400 to 600 between 2017 and 2019.
- Increased access to inputs, credit and markets.
- Increased understanding of good agricultural practices and proper application of agro-inputs.
- Facilitated timely application of farm inputs.
- Improved financial forecasting and planning for smallholder farmers.
- Increased yields of maize from 18 to 32 bags (50 kg) per acre, and of rice from 35 to 45 bags (50 kg) per acre, between 2017 and 2019.
