Solutions (507)
The digital is bringing fish farmers the opportunities to improve their business and profit. It also allows them to own an essential part of the value chain.
When Dave Okech (pictured, left) started fish farming in Kenya in 2016, he immediately noticed the problems plaguing the sector, including low productivity and lack of technical assistance. Interested in technology, he develops digital tools to help address these obstacles.
He then created AquaRech in 2018. The solution is a package made of a mobile app, a connected thermometer, and a web platform. The mobile app incorporates a centralized database system that connects fish farmers, fish traders, and feed suppliers. It is available on Android and allows users to calculate the amount of feed needed by the fish population based on the water temperature. This data is collected via the connected thermometer installed in the fish breeding tank. Having an idea of the amount of food needed by their fish, farmers can directly contact producers via the web platform without going through intermediaries which made the process tedious.
Using Dave Okech's solution allows fish farmers to reduce the production period from 13 to 8 months, increase yields, reduce production costs by 30% and increase profits by 25%. The promoter has received numerous awards for his many efforts in the fish farming industry in Kenya. These include the Mandela Washington Fellow 2016, the Acumen Fellow 2019, and the Global Farmer Network Fellow 2020.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
The low bancarization in Africa has long kept a large part of the population away from traditional financial services such as savings and credit. Tontines have become the way for the unbanked to access these services.
To make this informal savings method more effective, given its proven social impact over many years in Africa, Nigerian Bernie Akporiaye launched MaTontine- a financial service platform that uses digital technology to modernize traditional savings circles. MaTontine, currently available in Senegal, provides access to small loans and a range of financial services such as micro-insurance to its customers. “We solve the problem by utilizing mobile phones and our platform to digitize the benefits of traditional savings circles (ROSCAs), thereby reducing the cost of borrowing by 75% or more,” explains Bernie Akporiaye.
The platform's members contribute to an online kitty and collect the amount in turns. According to Bernie Akporiaye, members receive a credit score based on their payment morality, from which partners can offer them small loans or contracts. The use of the basic service is free of charge, the startup being financed via the commissions taken from the services of its partners Cofina and Sunu Assurance.
The particularity of MaTontine is that it uses old-generation mobile phones, unlike most competing fintech companies that use smartphones; 90% of the platform’s members are women. Bernie Akporiaye stressed that the Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted how vulnerable these women are, most of whom “live on less than $5 a day." MaTontine is therefore working on integrating other services such as financial education, to better prepare users for a possible future crisis.
The startup won the 3rd prize in Orange’s AfricaCom Awards competition in 2016 and a grant from the GSMA Ecosystem Accelerator innovation fund in February 2018. It was honored in 2019 by Inclusive Fintech 50 Fintech, an initiative by MetLife Foundation, Visa, Accion, and IFC. Since its launch, MaTontine has registered 6,000 customers and disbursed $200,000 in loans.
Ruben Tchounyabe
Malian pastoralist communities now have a digital solution to help them identify good pastures for their herds. The solution -STAMP (Sustainable Technology Adaptation for Mali’s Pastoralists) - is the fruit of a public-private partnership between the Malian Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries, Orange-Mali, the herders' organization "Tassaght," the international remote sensing service provider HSS, and the Netherlands International Development Organization (SNV). It was launched in 2017, the year in which the service won the 1st Orange Prize for Social Entrepreneurship Mali.
STAMP is a response to the grazing problems of pastoral populations in the Gao region, where industrial and agricultural activities, human and animal overpopulation, and climate change have reduced resources for livestock. The solution provides the beneficiaries with geo-satellite information on the availability and quality of biomass for feeding their livestock, the availability of surface water for watering, and also the concentration of animals around these resources. It also provides information on livestock and grain prices, as well as advice on animal health and financial products for livestock farmers. Users only have to call a center managed by Orange Mali or dial a USSD code on basic mobile phones to instantly obtain important data for their movement.
On December 17, 2020, during a press conference in Bamako, Thomas Sommerhalter, the STAMP project manager explained that the "producer surveys (carried out as part of the project, ed) revealed that reliability and the need for timely information are key to decision-making by pastoralists."
STAMP also integrates two other services to help farmers obtain information on weather, planting methods, seeds, planting time, fertilizers, etc. The head of the corporate social responsibility division at Orange Mali, Abdoul Malick Diallo, explained that the client advisors speak local languages, including Fulani, Dogon, Songhai, and Bamanankan to facilitate talks with the community.
Ruben Tchounyabe
Tech4dev announced it is launching a new edition of its women Techsters fellowship. The non-profit social enterprise wants, through this initiative, to bridge the digital divide between men and women in the tech sector.
The training combines theory and practice to give women the opportunity to enter the job market. It is specifically designed for technology novices who are encountering technology for the first time. Applicants for the scholarship must be between the ages of 16 and 40 and reside in one of the following countries: South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Ethiopia, DR Congo, Tanzania, Uganda, Algeria, South Sudan, Morocco, Angola, Mozambique, Madagascar, and Egypt.
Successful candidates will be trained in the skills of blockchain, cybersecurity, data science and artificial intelligence engineering, mixed reality/3D animation, mobile application development, product design (UI/UX), product management, and software development.
The Women Techsters Fellowship Program aims to increase the number of girls and women with improved livelihoods and access to digital jobs. The program will begin in May 2022 for one year, including 6 months of intensive training, followed by a 6-month internship. At the same time, learners will participate in a mentoring program to help them build technology careers and technology-based businesses. Applications are due by March 22, 2022.
Vanessa Ngono Atangana
Household waste management has been a major problem in African cities for several years. A Malagasy startup has entered the sector using digital technology to protect the planet.
In Madagascar, like the rest of the world, as the population grows, the volume of waste produced also grows; 50% of garbage in the country still ends up in the streets according to the NGO Ran'Eau. In 2017, the local startup Greentsika launched its household waste collection service using digital tools. Tested and deployed in Tuléar, in the south of Madagascar, the solution is the result of a collaboration with the German NGO Welthungerhilfe, which handles the transportation of waste to landfills.
Greentsika’s service is accessible via mobile phone, email, social networks, or directly at the company's offices. The solution offers various means of payment, including mobile money transfers, bank transfers, checks, and cash. The monthly subscription fee for a household starts at 4,000 ariary ($1), for two to six pickups per week of a 50 kg bag of waste. The fee for businesses (hotels, restaurants, schools, government offices, etc.) starts at 20,000 ariary. The subscriber company chooses the days it wants to have the waste collected and the agent who is dedicated to it.
Subscribers are given a card with a barcode that Greentsika's agents will scan at each garbage pickup. The unique barcodes allow Greentsika to have reliable data on the number of pickups made in a household or business. They also enable the startup to know the coverage of its agents and track their routes in real-time, and identify the customers who have paid their subscription. Rajaofera Gaëtan, one of the four co-founders of Greentsika, said the entire system is cloud-based.
Greentsika, accelerated by Orange Fab Madagascar in 2019, already claims 2,300 customers, 160 garbage pickups per day for 7 tons of waste collected daily. The startup aims to cover the entire city of Tulear and enter other cities, creating more job opportunities. In 2020, Rajaofera Gaëtan estimated that 5 to 6% of households in Tulear were covered.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
Burkinabe startup AINO Digital SAS has developed a multi-faceted digital identification bracelet. Called SAUVIE, the device is equipped with a QR code where personal health information and contacts of important people to reach in case of emergency are stored.
With this initiative presented to the public on February 23, AINO Digital SAS wants to ensure that everyone has their personal health information in case of emergency. Scarlett Zongo (pictured, left), CEO of AINO Digital SAS, explains that the solution is "an application for first responders such as firefighters and doctors. Thanks to SAUVIE, the patient's relatives are alerted of the nature of the emergency and the health facility where he or she is being treated". AINO Digital SAS says that for personal safety, the QR codes are encrypted and can only be read by firefighters and health workers using a special device.
AINO Digital SAS donated nine bracelet models to the public when presenting the device. The basic annual cost of the SAUVIE system is $6.83 plus the price of the wristband on which it is mounted (between $1.2 and $1.71). Three billable options are also available with the basic subscription: Alerting the employer in case of emergency ($8.54), Alerting the insurance company ($3.42), and Alerting a relative ($1.71). If the bracelet is stolen, lost, or damaged, the owner must report it to AINO Digital SAS so that the QR code can be canceled. Another one is automatically generated and integrated into the new bracelet.
Supported by Orange Burkina Faso, which does not charge any data fees when reading the QR code, the startup is working with the Ministry of Health to get the solution to be used in health centers and local security services. Scarlett Zongo is convinced that her innovation can improve the health system in Burkina Faso.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
The Tunisian transport market has welcomed, since 2016, a new operator. eFret.tn is an innovative startup that connects shippers (individuals or companies) with transport and transit companies. It operates an online market platform where shippers describe their needs and receive free quotes from carriers, movers, and international transport companies as well as customs agents.
With this method, carriers can offer competitive rates, optimize their routes through grouping and also reduce empty returns. After delivery, the carriers are evaluated twice both by the site and the customers.
eFret.tn was created in 2016 by two partners specialized in e-commerce, e-business, and logistics. The idea was to simplify logistics in Tunisia and optimize transport by making it cheaper and facilitating the obtention of transport quotes. The platform takes into account different types of services, including local land transport (moving, parcels, transport of goods within Tunisia); international air transport (transport of goods, parcels, and freight, to and from Tunisia in import or export); international maritime transport (transport of goods, containers, and goods to or from Tunisia); customs transit (freight forwarder service to carry out the customs formalities for all import or export operations to or from Tunisia).
eFret.tn is a sort of transport exchange that makes the activity more optimized and economical. Co-founder Wajdi Ben Rejeb (pictured) explains that by optimizing the movements of carriers through the grouping and management of empty returns, the startup can reduce CO2 emissions and help preserve the environment. This innovation earned it the 2017 Orange Social Entrepreneurship Award. Wajdi Ben Rejeb pointed out that obtaining this award has helped increase tenfold the number of ads from shippers on the platform.
Ruben Tchounyabe
The application was born out of the desire of the startup Nchimsy Teq to make Cameroon a top travel destination in the world. TourCmr showcases both sung and unsung places in the country.
The TourCmr app is a bilingual digital travel guide designed by the startup Nchimsy Teq, founded by Bryan Pemwoya Pangsui (pictured). Approved by the Ministry of Tourism and Leisure as an official tourism promotion app in Cameroon, the solution was officially launched on November 2, 2021. It features more than 150 tourist sites classified by cities and surroundings, in the ten regions of Cameroon, with descriptions, photos, and videos.
“This digital guide gives its users information about sites to visit across the country. Information is available about hotels, restaurants, and bus stations. The user can design their own tourist route with the app," explains Armand Noah, head of communication at the Ministry of Tourism and Leisure. Nchimsy Te worked with the ministry to develop the travel guide.
The app can work without the internet. It is downloadable on Play Store and App Store. In addition to tourist sites, TourCmr also allows visitors to find hotels, restaurants, banks, and supermarkets around the site they want to visit. Users can also book travel services and pay via mobile money. The "find the embassy" function provides tourists with information on all embassies in Cameroon, including contacts, location, and directions.
Nchimsy Teq aims to build the largest travel and booking platform for Cameroon. This will also stimulate domestic tourism as several tourist sites listed in the app are also unknown by Cameroonians. According to Bryan Pemwoya Pangsui, the travel app has already recorded over 9,000 downloads on Android and IOS.
Ruben Tchounyabe
Earnipay, which launched as a pilot last September, has already attracted the interest of investors. The fintech aims to reach nearly 200,000 employees with its flexible, on-demand payroll service by the end of 2022.
Earnipay, the Nigerian fintech that offers employees flexible and regular access to their salaries, has secured $4 million in pre-seed funding to accelerate its business in the country.
“Earnipay has quickly established itself with a product built specifically for the payroll behaviors of this region, and early employer uptake is very strong. Nonso (the MD, ed) has built one of the strongest teams that we’ve met on the entire continent, and we’re thrilled for the opportunity to partner with them,” said Brendan Dickinson, general partner at Canaan, the VC firm that led the deal.
After he faced employee departures due to the monthly payroll system instituted at his first-ever plastic waste recycling company, which launched in 2019 in Ghana, Nonso Onwuzulike decided to revamp that payment method by offering a more regular and flexible employee payroll system as part of a new business venture in Nigeria.
Earnipay, which was only launched on a trial basis last September, claims to have served employees of about 20 companies in Nigeria to date. Its app has been used more than 1,000 times. Confident in its growth prospects, Earnipay aims to offer its flexible, on-demand salary access service to at least 200,000 employees by the end of this year.
In Nigeria, salaries for employees in the formal sector are paid monthly, while those in the informal sector are paid daily, according to several local media. Short of cash between paychecks, employees have no other option than to borrow or to ask for an advance on their salary with sometimes high-interest rates. Earnipay's solution is therefore a relief for these employees.
Chamberline Moko
Led by the AfCFTA Secretariat, in collaboration with African regional economic communities and governments, the solution addresses the challenges related to the cumbersome process of implementing a single market.
On January 1, 2021, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) came into effect. Supported by 54 countries, its objective is to create a single continental market that promotes the free flow of goods and services. Given the size of the measures that must be undertaken by every member country, and to ensure the successful implementation of the market, the AfCFTA secretariat has developed the digital tool tradebarriers.africa. The latter is a kind of customer service that will allow African entrepreneurs to report cases of non-tariff barriers (NTBs) within the market. NTBs include excessive border fees, cumbersome documentation requirements, or restrictive product regulations.
NTBs are classified into seven categories: government participation in trade and restrictive practices tolerated by governments, customs, and administrative entry procedures, technical barriers to trade, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, specific limitations, charges on imports, others (transport, clearing, and forwarding, etc.).
To report an NTB, the user must first register on the platform by filling out a form. Next, they activate their registration on tradebarriers.africa via a link sent to the email address provided during registration for confirmation. Once this step is completed, the account is active, the reporting of an NTB is done with the "Report an NTB" button. A reporting form is then proposed to the user with information to be filled in.
According to the AfCFTA secretariat, once a non-tariff barrier is reported, the governments concerned will follow up to resolve the problem. The NTB coordination units of the secretariat, those of the regional economic communities, and the national focal points will support the process. The complainant can find out about his or her complaint - whether it is still being processed or resolved - directly on the platform, which is available in English, French, Arabic, and Portuguese.
For greater efficiency in reporting non-tariff barriers, the AfCFTA Secretariat is currently working on a service that will be accessible on mobile phones.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
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UK-based mobile satellite communication provider Inmarsat announced a partnership with RLTT Digital Oilfields to provide digital solutions to oil operators in Libya. The announcement was made on February 2.
The partnership will leverage Inmarsat's IsatData Pro (IDP) and BGAN technologies to provide secure satellite-based data services to oil and gas producers. This will enable comprehensive monitoring of vital infrastructure, including wellheads at oil and gas drilling sites and production sites in oil basins. Producers will therefore be able to anticipate problems related to the deterioration of key assets on platforms, replace faulty equipment timely, and better plan maintenance work. The solution will help optimize production at the sites.
The partners plan to expand the offering to include monitoring, telemetry, tracking, and fleet management. The services will be provided by Inmarsat's ELERA L-band connectivity network, which boasts ultra-reliable 99.9% availability and small, robust terminals.
“Inmarsat’s experience in providing IoT-over-satellite connectivity for the industry means that it understands the types of products and services we want to offer to the oil and gas sector in Libya […] Operators across the country are digitalizing their operations to increase efficiency and output and improve on-site safety and security for staff. Our new partnership with Inmarsat puts RLTT in an excellent position to take full advantage of this growth opportunity,” said Taha Ellafi, Chairman at RLTT.
Commenting on the partnership, Mike Carter, President of Inmarsat Enterprise, said: “As the industry automates its infrastructure and its processes to enable remote monitoring and asset management, it reduces the need to travel to remote, potentially hazardous places. This results in benefits in terms of efficiencies, sustainability, and safety.”
The educational technology company Mavis Computel has been active in Nigeria for the past four years. It has managed to become a major actor in the education sector through its digital audio learning solution, Mavis Talking Books.
A Mavis Talking Book is a kit made of a digital pen (Mavis Pen) and a book with a special print. When the pen touches text or images in the book, it plays the matching audio recording. The books are suitable for both children and adults. The idea was born out of the desire of Chizaram Ucheaga, co-founder of Mavis Computel, to combat illiteracy in Nigeria, where the rate was about 39% in 2018 according to Unesco.
Chizaram Ucheaga explains that Mavis Talking Book allows “the provision of high quality, learner-centered education for all, irrespective of literacy level, location or language at a fraction of the cost of conventional educational approaches." Mavis Talking Books are translated into several local languages to facilitate learning for those who do not understand English.
“We have talking books for literacy, numeracy, health, and other subjects – for example, English with phonics, mathematics, languages (French, Arabic, Spanish, Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba). The books are designed to help semi-skilled or unskilled teachers teach while guiding the children to learn at the same time. We program quality content, developed by experts, into the talking book format in a language that the user understands, thereby solving both the quality and language barrier challenges. The talking books follow the national curriculum. They don’t require the Internet to function. One Mavis Pen can work with up to 100 different books,” he said.
Mavis Computel's books have become popular with a variety of targets, including farmers who can learn new agricultural approaches to develop their production. According to Chizaram Ucheaga, more than 8,000 in-school and out-of-school children in Lagos State and the Federal Capital Territories of Nigeria have already benefited from the innovation, through literacy and numeracy programs funded by UK Aid and the US Embassy since 2018. The startup hopes to reach 10,000 children, through a program funded by Borno State.
“For the various deployments, we provide a full range of services, which include stakeholder and community engagement, training for teachers, headteachers and state or local government education officials as well as officials from relevant agencies, conducting baseline to end line tests, deployment of the talking books and solar/inverter kits for charging the pens, regular monitoring, and evaluation, project documentary,” the founder said.
The solar kits ensure that teachers in rural areas, where electricity supply is unreliable or non-existent, can charge the digital pens each day after class. In this way, learners in marginalized communities are not excluded.
Ruben Tchounyabe
On January 1, 2021, the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) officially became operational. Recently, the Zone reached a new milestone by launching its payment solution.
The Pan African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS) was officially launched in West Africa on 13 January 2022, in Accra, Ghana. The cross-border payment platform was developed by Afreximbank and successfully tested in Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone. Integrating a growing network of central banks, commercial banks, payment service providers, and other financial intermediaries, PAPSS will serve as the settlement interface for the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
“The commercial launch marks a significant milestone in connecting African markets seamlessly. It will provide a fresh impetus for businesses to scale more easily across Africa and is likely to save the continent more than $5 billion in transaction costs every year,” said Mike Ogbalu III (pictured), the chief executive officer of the financial platform.
PAPSS will connect African markets, enabling instant cross-border payments in local African currencies. It can be used for purchases, money transfers, wage payments, stock and share trading, or major business transactions. No more transfer fees, SWIFT fees, and bank charges. No more worries about exchange rates.
For example, a user in Mali can buy goods in Ghana from an SME, pay in CFA francs and the seller will get the payment in cedis. This is how it works: After the Malian buyer issues a payment order in the local currency (CFA) to his affiliated financial institution, the latter submits the transaction to PAPSS, which then proceeds to the necessary validation checks. Next, the payment order is forwarded to the seller's financial institution that gets the payment done in the local currency.
PAPSS collaborates with African central banks to provide a payment and settlement service that commercial banks, payment service providers, and fintechs in Africa can connect to as "Participants."
With PAPSS, central banks can instantly process settlements, hence reducing their hard currency holdings. Compliance, legal, and sanction checks are performed instantly by the system which processes transactions within seconds, thereby dealing with delays that constitute a significant barrier to the growth of African e-commerce, services, and products.
To access PAPSS, banks and other financial institutions must register and meet some criteria. The platform features two types of participants: direct and indirect. “Direct Participants”, banks and other financial institutions, have a settlement account with the central bank of the country in which they operate and comply with all the financial and regulatory proficiency requirements of that central bank.
"Indirect Participants", also banks and other financial institutions, do not have a settlement account with the central bank of the country in which they operate. They may, however, enter into individual sponsorship arrangements with direct participants to facilitate the settlement of payment instructions.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
Senegalese multiple award-winning agtech startup Tolbi announced plans to raise $500,000 this year to develop its activity. Tolbi, which means field in Wolof, was founded by Mouhamadou Lamine Kébé, a graduate of the Dakar polytechnic school who majored in telecom network systems. Lamine initiated the idea in 2019 with three of his classmates to tackle the water management problems experienced by Senegalese farmers.
Tolbi offers a set of connected objects based on artificial intelligence and edge computing to facilitate field irrigation and improve agricultural yield. "We use drones, satellite imagery, and connected objects with moisture sensors to allow the user to have real-time information about the water and fertilizer needs of their fields. This helps optimize irrigation and improve yield. It makes it possible to reduce water and fuel inputs upstream, thus reducing production costs," Mouhamadou Lamine Kébé explained.
Tolbi’s team of engineers process the data collected by sensors through AI algorithms to extract key information for decision making. The analyzed data is made available to users via dedicated apps to enable them to make a decision. The solution is accessible to all farmers, even those with modest incomes or illiterate, via a mobile phone and a SIM card. All the farmer has to do is dial the device number and interact with a voice command system in Wolof or Pulaar, two languages spoken in Senegal.
"We have succeeded in optimizing agricultural yields by up to 30% while reducing water losses by up to 60%," Lamine Kébé said. The startup has grown well since its launch and now offers many other services such as plant counting, land shaping, yield estimation, plant health analysis, and weed analysis.
The strong impact Tolbi has on agriculture has earned it several awards including the Grand Prix of the President of the Republic for Digital Innovation in 2020. The startup aims to become a leader in smart agriculture in Africa. For the upcoming year, it plans to enter Nigeria, Kenya, Algeria, and Morocco.
In 2018, agriculture contributed 9.4% to Senegal's GDP, according to the 2020 report of the National Agency for Statistics and Demography (ANSD).
Ruben Tchounyabe