- Agriculture has massive social and economic impact in Africa: it generates up to 40% of GDP, provides livelihood for 70% of the continent’s population; expected to reach $1 trillion in value by 2030
- Still, the sector suffers from considerable inefficiencies hindering growth: low productivity, fragmented supply chains, and excessive post-harvest losses
- Tingo aims to solve these challenges for Africa’s key industry: NWASSA platform streamlines agribusiness supply chains by connecting actors in one digital marketplace, intends to provide direct connection to company’s SuperApp that offers mobile wallet
Tingo (OTCQB: IWBB), a digital service agri-fintech technology company focused on providing financial services to agriculture in Africa, appears committed to tackling some of the biggest social and economic challenges the continent faces today through its innovative technology that can uplift rural communities and open international opportunities.
The importance of agriculture for the African continent cannot be overstated. It generates 20-40% of Africa’s GDP and around 70% of the continent’s population is connected to agriculture. This means that more than half a billion Africans rely on small or micro-scale farming as their main source of livelihood (https://ibn.fm/duNX6).
But although agriculture is of colossal importance and is projected to grow further to become a $1 trillion industry by 2030, the sector appears considerably underfunded. It is estimated that this massive sector receives less than 3% of banking credit. Often overlooked, it now suffers from considerable inefficiencies. For example, the productivity of African agriculture is one of the lowest in the world. Also, the sector suffers from fragmented supply chains, and the post-harvest loss is considerable—in many African countries it reaches 25% of the total crop harvested. Food waste occurs primarily at the early stages of the value chain due to financial, technical, and managerial constraints in harvesting techniques and storage and cooling facilities. In Sub-Saharan Africa alone, these losses are estimated at $4 billion per year—enough to feed at least 48 million people (https://ibn.fm/Hr5AK).
Challenges faced by African agriculture are considerable, but technology can help. According to the World Bank, to help African farmers grow their income, it is necessary to improve their commercialization capabilities and provide them with access to better technologies and financial tools (https://ibn.fm/G4PKp). This is where Tingo steps up to the challenge to enhance farmers’ access to appropriate tools and financial services to boost shared prosperity across the continent.
Leveraging the unique ‘device as a service’ model, Tingo provides farmers with connectivity through simple smartphone technology. Tingo’s Agri-Marketplace platform NWASSA is a digital marketplace that connects actors across the agricultural value chain allowing everyone to engage in agribusiness. As the digital platform that helps deliver fresh produce from the farm to market, NWASSA streamlines agriculture supply chains and supports the economic activity in an effective and efficient way with the potential to reduce post-harvest loss. Every percentage reduction of the currently excessive post-harvest losses brings direct monetary value to farmers that use NWASSA. More importantly, through TingoPay customers have access to mobile wallets, micro-loans and other financial services all connected seamlessly to the Agri-Marketplace platform.
Tingo’s revolutionary solution offers a blueprint to deliver the future of agriculture and a ‘seed to offtake’ private marketplace model that can help solve the food security challenges in Africa. As the agricultural productivity improves, this model also provides a solution that can provide import substitution, saving the countries across the continent precious foreign exchange reserves. In contrast, fragmented supply chains in sub-Saharan Africa’s agriculture currently led to a 20 to 50% markup compared to import prices (https://ibn.fm/oR6JU).
Since GDP in emerging countries tends to grow when economies are driven through rural investment and growth, Tingo can catalyze massive macro and micro impact in rural communities in Africa. With the power of its proprietary Agri-Fintech platform and the scale of having almost 10 million farmers across the rural communities connected, Tingo makes these ambitious goals more achievable.
For more information, visit the company’s website at www.TingoGroup.com.
NOTE TO INVESTORS: The latest news and updates relating to IWBB are available in the company’s newsroom at https://ibn.fm/IWBB
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