KENYA – Shamba Pride, an online-to-offline platform connecting small farmers to quality supplies, services, and information, has secured a US$3.7 million debt-equity pre-series A funding to bolster its efforts in enhancing last-mile distribution for farm inputs in Kenya.
The investment was facilitated by the EU agriculture financing initiative EDFI AgriFI and Seedstars Africa Ventures (SAV), comprising US$1.7 million in equity. Notably, this funding follows a prior capital infusion of US$1.1 million in 2021 from SAV and Gray Matters Capital.
The agtech, founded in 2016, has amassed a network of 2,700 merchants, known as digishops, spread across 24 counties in Kenya, covering over half of the country. The primary goal of this funding is to further expand Shamba Pride’s presence in Kenya, including an expansion of its franchise network.
Additionally, the company aims to address farm input supply chain challenges, such as sourcing, unpredictable prices, quality issues, and stockouts, by venturing into neighboring markets like Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia.
Shamba Pride digitizes agro-dealers to power various tasks including business management and inventory ordering, which ensures the availability of supplies like fertilizers and seeds to millions of small-scale farmers in rural areas.
“Agriculture distribution in rural communities is heavily controlled by agro-dealers who decide how farmers access inputs, services and training,” Shamba Pride founder and CEO, Samuel Munguti, said.
“We are empowering these agro-dealers by giving them the right tools and technology for visibility of their businesses, for their professional and commercial development and the right support for farmers around them.”
The agtech also provides farmers with market linkages, Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) financial services and training information through its USSD platform.
It mainly targets small-scale farmers that are part of Kenya’s agriculture sector, which contributes 33% of the country’s gross domestic product, and employs over 40% of the country’s population and more than 70% of those in rural settings. It also accounts for 65% of its export earnings, making it a key sector of the country’s economy and a focus area for innovators.
“Shamba Pride’s success is based on innovations that facilitate day-to-day farming activities. We’ve been proud to support a scalable model which creates additional revenues for farmers and agrovets (agro-dealers) and strongly contributes to successful women entrepreneurship,” said Maxime Bouan, a general partner at SAV, which last week received US$30 million and US$10.5 million from EIB and AFDB, respectively.
SAV is a sector-agnostic fund keen on startups that address basic needs such as education, healthcare and utilities, or enhancing goods, services and efficiency.
Shamba Pride sources inventory from partners such as French multinational Elephant Verve that supplies it with “climate-smart” farm inputs, which is part of the agtech’s strategy to build resilience for small-holder farmers.
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