Ten Senses Africa is a social enterprise working directly with nearly 30,000 smallholder farmers to produce and export Organic and Fair Trade macadamia and cashew nuts from Kenya. The company upgraded Macadamia out grower management system through block chain technology and automation of purchasing, training, certification, documentation and contracting processes.
Innovation
- Kenya has about 30 macadamia processors. Majority purchase products from small holder farmers using hard cash which poses several challenges such as leakage, lack of transparency and a lack of access to credit by the farmers as they cannot build credit history. Most of these challenges can be remedied by removing cash from the process and implementing cutting edge technology such as block chain to solve common pain points.
- Ten Senses Africa is a social enterprise working directly with nearly 30,000 smallholder farmers to produce and export Organic and Fair Trade macadamia and cashew nuts from Kenya. It has 150 field officers, 30,000 farmers in cooperatives, capacity to process 400 MT per month of raw macadamia, 400 workers, of which 90% are women and 45-60 MT per month of finished product shipped.
- The company seeks to upgrade the Macadamia outgrower management system through block chain technology that will enhance security of information, establish systems to collect and analyze data, and enhance transparency and traceability of farmer and business data.
Key Milestones under KCJF
- Ten Senses has developed a prototype for the block chain system. The company has recruited 15,000 macadamia farmers from whom they buy regularly. TSA exports between 182-210 Metric Tons of processed macadamia and buys up to 1,400,000 KG of Nuts in Shell annually from the small holder farmers. In addition, they have recruited and trained 100 field officers who purchase, train and keep inventory of farmers.
- Over 1500 farmers on the TSA outgrower scheme have generated 380 Million KES in income.
- TSA has created 100 jobs at the factory (over 90% for women).
Founders Profile
Frank Omondi is the Managing Director who is currently leading the expansion and operations at Ten Senses Africa. He has over ten years working intensively in social and change programs among them, the Marketing Strategy Advisor to the then Minister for Tourism Kenya, Hon. Danson Mwazo, Co-owner and Director at Finch Travels Ltd and Kiwanjani Ecolodge in Tsavo as well as leading wildlife policy advocacy with several NGOs recently Youth for Conservation. He holds a degree in Wildlife Management from Moi University, Kenya.
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