presentation piet heemskerk

Africa Agribusiness Academy Investing in knowledge for

entrepreneurship

Piet Heemskerk: [email protected]

AgriBusiness Forum 2010 | 3 – 6 October 2010 | Kampala, Uganda.

Summary

- Entrepreneurship is key to development of food

security

- Learning from own experience – digital platforms and

sharing business cases

- Validation and brokering of knowledge

- Private sector in the lead


Background on food security

- 2010: One billion people chronically hungry (265 million

in Africa)

- MDG 1: halving hunger in 2015

- Global consensus on strategy: productivity increase

and market access for small scale farmers

- Limited entrepreneurial knowledge and skills by

operators in agrifood sector

- Our entry point: SMEs in agrifood sector to be drivers for

rural and urban development


Starting points

- Focus on entrepreneurship in Africa

- SME’s as ‘pull’ factor and leverage for linking small

farmers to markets

- Enhanced SME activity leads to higher food security

- Build on best practices / business cases

- Business community takes the lead

- Partnering & Networking, Resource center, Education

& Training


Africa Agribusiness Academy

A vibrant action and

learning network of

entrepreneurs

Education &

Training to

enhance

business skills

Resource Centre

supporting the network

- Creating opportunities

- Community of practice

- Business clubs

- Documenting practice

- Research, policy advice

- Newsletter, Q&A services

- Web based info sharing

- Coaching trajectories

- Tailor-made training

- Internships

- Business trips



African SME champions

- Need for networking, training and knowledge sharing

became apparent

- Partnership Dutch Agribusiness-Sokoine University –

Wageningen UR

- 15 African SME champions agreed to become

founding members

- Group has spin–off to 30,000 small farmers, so high

leverage


Organic growth

Organic growth

15

champions

5 champions

+ 15 upstarts

May 2010

Oct 2010

Mar 2011

Nov 2011

• Tanzania • Kenya • Uganda Focus groups

5 champions

+ 15 upstarts

5 champions

+ 15 upstarts


Next steps

- Kick-off workshop (May 2010): entrepreneurial spirit

among founding members

- Business plan 2010-11: agreed upon by founding

members,

- Launch (Nov 2010): prepare and start implementing

action plans

- Expanding from 15 to 400 members, tailor-made

trainings, resource base

- Going to Scale event: business planning 2012-2015


Africa Agribusiness Academy

“Home grown entrepreneurship”

“Investing in knowledge for entrepreneurship”

For more information, please contact:

Mr. Bram Huijsman, Wageningen University & Research

Centre, The Netherlands

Tel: (+31) 6 5138 1215

Mail: [email protected]