How Desmond Koney founded Complete Farmer, a crowdfarming platform in Ghana allowing anyone to become a farmer from the comfort of their home

How Desmond Koney founded Complete Farmer, a crowdfarming platform in Ghana allowing anyone to become a farmer from the comfort of their home

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In today’s episode, we speak to Desmond Koney, CEO and cofounder of Complete Farmer.

Complete Farmer is a crowdfarming platform founded and based in Ghana that makes it easier for industries to source for quality farm produce in the African market and at the same time, allows anyone to fund a farming cycle as a crowdfarmer from their smartphone, get regular updates about the farm, sign up for an in person farm visit and yes, also to participate in the profits from the farming cycle. When asked how he came up with the idea to start it, he shares that he was exposed to the frustrations of smallholder farming since his father was a smallholder farmer growing pineapples.

After coming back home to Ghana from his studies in The Netherlands, he got the idea to apply his engineering skills to build more efficient farms on the continent.

In the interview we chat about

• How Desmond and his cofounders became farmers themselves in order to learn about farming and identifying the real pain points and bottlenecks that farmers in Ghana face every day
• The lessons that they learned from that experience,
• How they financed the launch of their business
• and so much more

As of the date of the release of this podcast I am also farming with Complete Farmer. I have a few acres of sweet potato and chilli pepper under contract with them and am hoping for a good farming season.

There is a ton of insights as well as inspiration in this interview for anyone interested in agriculture, tech entrepreneurship in Africa or just anyone curious about how to assure food security.

You can also check out the AfricaX blogpost about Desmond and Complete Farmer.

We really hope you will enjoy this episode, and now, enter Desmond.

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