KENYANS FARMERS REAPING BIG WITH M-FARM

For many low-volume Kenyan farmers, the only source of information about the market rate for crops comes from the very people who are trying to buy them. The lack of pricing transparency means that farmers don't always get the best deal

M Farm seeks to solve this by providing up-to-date market prices via an app or SMS, direct to farmers. It also connects farmers with buyers directly, cutting out the middlemen.

MFarm's CEO is Jamila Abass, a 29-year-old computer scientist from Kenya founded MFarm in 2010 after reading about how farmers have been "oppressed for decades and disconnected in terms of information".

Miss Abass and her team developed a tool that allows farmers to SMS the number 20255 to receive information relating to the retail price of their products

 "Farmers don't have storage facilities and they know that the buyer who comes around to the farm can just go next door and get produce from someone else. So we could end up taking away the only access to market they have," Abass explained.
MFarm has also developed a group buying tool, allowing farmers to pool resources to negotiate better prices for things like fertilizer.

Transactions are all handled by MFarm's integrated mobile money transfer system -- drawing on mobile payment technology MPesa -- but can also be plugged into people's bank accounts (if they have one). 

When an order is placed through MFarm, the farmer takes his or her produce to the designated collection point and sends a message to confirm the produce has been delivered. 
 
  The buyer then collects the produce and verifies the quantity and quality by sending a message to MFarm. Once that's been confirmed and the order has been fulfilled, the money is released by MFarm to the farmer's account.