A youth-owned business involved in feed formulation, milling and distribution under the Farmer’s Smile brand is making a difference for farmers in Kiambu. The enterprise also organizes farmer training sessions for dairy and other value chains. Farmer’s Smile founder and CEO Peter Nganga, saw the need to create events for farmers where they can meet, interact and share their experiences as they showcase their products. Most farmers end up buying wrong products as they are misdirected on what they should apply in their farms and incur losses. The dire need for farmers to access quality products pushed Peter to start Farmers smile and come to the rescue of the agripreneurs.
Farmer’s Smile has set up a last mile distribution which is helping smallholder farmers in rural areas get information, services and quality farm inputs. The SME which is a beneficiary of the Agribiz programme started in 2016. Farmer’s Smile has so far received a website, bookkeeping techniques and marketing strategies from the programme.
Peter underscores their current plans as they continue to reach out to agripreneurs. “We are training youths on farming, marketing and finance. The impact of Agribiz program on my business is that it can now grow. Farmers can now get quality farm products and we have also created employment through the value chains,” said Peter
Peter chose to venture into the business because of the challenges farmers faced in the region. These challenges included lack of information, distribution of farm inputs, scarcity of raw materials and high cost of production.
Farmer’s Smile is now seeking to expand more and ensure farmers get the right information. When we visited an exhibition they hosted recently for farmers, we were surprised to find many farmers in attendance. Over 15 exhibitors were from the Farmer’s Smile brand.
Farmer’s Smile is also focused on mitigating the impact of climate change. “On climate change we are helping the young farmer to adapt. We are achieving this by pushing the farmer to plant trees that have value. This is a great initiative that I am much focused on. To ensure farmers plant more avocados trees as it will produce fruits and help adapt to climate change adverse effects,” said Peter.
We met a dairy farmer who has been using Farmer’s Smile products for the longest time. Teresia who has used Farmer’s Smile products for over 5 years says the product is good. ” I have made major steps in my life due to the products I get from Farmers smile. If it continues this way I will be able to achieve more in the coming years. I also cannot forget to thank the people supporting Farmers Smile. KCIC’s Agribiz programmes is doing a tremendous job,” said Teresia.
Moses Kamau , a pig farmer who also uses Farmer’s Smile products, praises the company’s feeds and says he has never regretted meeting Farmers’ Smile. He underscores that KCIC has done a great thing supporting Farmers’ Smile. ” You have done a great job to support such SMEs. Through that they have been able to reach us, thank you for the good job,” said Kamau. He also advised the youth to take up the task of going the extra mile and engaging in agriculture.
