Enacy Mapakame
Zimbabwe’s budding entrepreneur Tafadzwa Ron Chikwereti was recently named among 12 top innovators in Africa in the 2023 GoGettaz Agripreneur Competition hosted at the Africa Food Systems Summit in Tanzania.
His enterprise, eAgro leverages Artificial intelligence (AI) to provide solutions to challenges local smallholder farmers are facing such as pest attacks and post-harvest losses.
The GoGettaz Agripreneur prize competition is an annual event that seeks to identify and support the most innovative and promising agripreneurs in Africa. The competition is open to all African entrepreneurs between the ages of 18 and 35 who have innovative ideas for agricultural businesses.
“eAgro takes the guesswork out of farming in Zimbabwe by bundling complex technologies into a user-friendly WhatsApp chatbot.
“Their CropFix AI chatbot uses photos from a farmer’s mobile phone to diagnose pests and diseases and provide relevant, location-based agronomic advice in seconds,” said GoGettaz.
Mr Chikwereti was among African entrepreneurs who pitched their innovative ideas before a panel of judges and mentors.
In a social media post recently, Mr Chikwereti said: “I’m Ronald, a co-founder at eAgro, a forward-thinking tech startup dedicated to transforming farming through accessible digital tools. My mission? Empowering farmers to cultivate success and break free from their poverty cycle.
“My expertise lies at the intersection of project management and agriculture technology. I’m an AI enthusiast with a knack for leading people and resources toward a common goal.
“With a PMI-Project Management Professional certification under my belt, I thrive in turning challenges into opportunities, through our work.”
The GoGettaz Agripreneur programme is a brainchild of business people from across the region whose thrust is on promoting innovative ideas to solve everyday challenges that the region faces with the focus largely biased towards agriculture to boost food security and enhance farmers’ profitability.
Among them is Dr Strive Masiyiwa, founder of Econet Wireless who commended the young entrepreneurs taking part at this year’s summit.
“Our continent’s young agripreneurs are a testament to Africa’s innovative vision in action. I salute all our entrepreneurs, hailing from across Africa. The young men and women who competed in the live pitch competitions at the AGRF Summit this year are each winners for our continent, whether they received a prize on stage or not.
“We must continue to celebrate and support these amazing young people, most of whom designed innovative technology solutions to tackle both the food system and environmental challenges while creating new businesses and jobs. Generation Africa’s agripreneurs are leading the transformative change that needs to happen across Africa’s agri-food sector.”
The 2023 GoGettaz campaign reached almost seven million people and brought about half a million visitors to the Generation Africa website and GoGettaz community platform. The fifth annual GoGettaz Agripreneur Prize Competition received applications from 43 African countries, with nine represented in the Top 12.
According to GoGettaz, application data also shows an increase in female applicants this year.
“This is a very encouraging shift in an industry that is perceived as male-dominated, while the reality of African food production is very much in the hands of women small-holder farmers,” said the competition organisers.
Applications for 2024 will open again in April/May next year.
“The industry-leading partners and sponsors of Generation Africa are proud of the exceptional innovation, dedication, and leadership displayed by all the young entrepreneurs who participated this year throughout the process.
“Coming into focus for the rest of 2023 are mentorship programmes, such as the Generation Africa Fellowship Programme, and the important work of reshaping national policies for better support of youth and women in agriculture,” said GoGettaz.
The competition offers a grand prize of US$50 000 to two entrepreneurs, a woman and a man. The winners also receive mentorship and training from experienced agripreneurs.