Dr Adewale Oparinde, the Chief Executive Officer and Founder of EZ Farming, discusses his passion for creating rural economic growth and addressing youth unemployment challenges in Africa through commercial agriculture.
Adewale is an agricultural economist with over 15 years of industry experience in the agricultural and international development sectors. He received his PhD -with a specialisation in Agricultural and Resource Economics- from the University of Cambridge in 2011. He has worked in 10 countries across Africa and South-East Asia while collaborating with a variety of international institutions such as the World Bank, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture and the International Livestock Research Institute.
Flora IP (FI): Can you tell me about EZ Farming?
Dr Adewale Oparinde (AO): EZ Farming is a platform that makes it easy for everyone to get involved in agriculture. We started EZ farming because we noticed that a lot of young Africans are unemployed. About 60 per cent of unemployed people in Africa are youths. At the same time, about 60 per cent of uncultivated arable land in the world is located in Africa. Africa has human capital and land resources.
The youth unemployment challenge inspired the idea for EZ Farming on 10 January 2015.
On that day, about 20 young Nigerians, who were looking for jobs reached out to me. That was the moment that I realised that I had to do something about the unemployment in Nigeria.
What we have realised is that many young people want to go into agriculture, but they may not have access to land, capital and market. Also, they may not have the knowledge required to be successful in farming. We started talking to commercial farmers because we realised that farming has to be lucrative to attract young people. We also understood that some commercial farmers who wanted to expand their operations did not want to borrow from the banks because of the interest rates. For example, in Nigeria, the interest rate is as high as 25 per cent.
As such, we decided to set up a platform to connect the different stakeholders and to provide the opportunity for youth employment in agriculture.
FI: How did your (personal, academic and professional) background help in shaping the idea for EZ Farming?
AO: I grew up in Ede, Osun State, Nigeria, an agrarian community. My grandfather was a palm wine/palm tree farmer. My father is a teacher, farmer and businessman. When I was young, I used to go to the farm after school, and also help in the farming and other family businesses afterwards.
I grew up in farming and business environments.
My father wanted me to study medicine at the University, but even though I had the required grades, I wasn’t offered the course. I ended up studying Zoology for my first degree at the University of Ilorin, Nigeria. Coincidentally, this took me back to farming. I fell in love with aquaculture and wildlife.
After my first degree, I studied environmental management because I wanted to understand how to sustainably manage natural resources. I ended up doing a PhD in agriculture and resource economics at the University of Cambridge.
After that, I worked with the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) in Washington DC, one of the CGIAR centres, for almost ten years. That environment exposed me to the diversity in agricultural policies and the problems in agricultural systems, both from the public and private sector perspectives.
As a researcher, I had the opportunity to advise various country programmes and governments, particularly on biofortification programmes. That experience helped me to think about how to build a coalition of stakeholders to fix some of the problems in African agricultural systems.
My personal, academic and professional experiences have certainly helped with setting up the EZ farming.
FI: For those interested in partnering, investing or working with EZ Farming, can you share more about its structure and how it works?
AO: The EZ Farming model of contract farming is not new, we are just modernising it. Historically, farmers around the world have engaged in contract farming.
I remember that my father used to rent land from some of the villagers in my village, with the promise to give them a share of output at the end of the production cycle. There was a contract of land partnership in that respect. I also remember that some entrepreneurs used to come from Lagos to contract cocoa farmers in my village, Ede in Osun State. They would give the farmers money, cocoa seed, and other chemical inputs to farm. The entrepreneurs would then return to share the produce with the farmers.
The contract farming model has been ongoing since time immemorial. We are just making it easy for everyone to get involved in the contract production model.
The EZ Farming model is very simple. All investors have to do is to check the different investment portfolios available on the EZ Farming website.
EZ Farming is unique because we connect people with opportunities in commercial farming. What this means is that there are opportunities to earn better returns from farmers that are operating commercial farms.
Second, since EZ Farming was established to provide jobs for unemployed youths, every commercial farmer featured on the EZ Farming platform is mandated to attend EZ Farming boot camps to recruit unemployed youths interested in farming. In other words, investors are providing the opportunity to leverage the energy and intelligence of young people who constitute the majority of the African population.
Third, we have data scientists that apply data to design our investment portfolio. We don’t just decide to grow crops. We use data to predict which commodities will be less risky and offer high returns in the next farming season. For example, armyworms are destroying maize farms across Africa. Using data, we can predict the chances of that outbreak happening. We use science and data to design our investment portfolios to ensure that investments are secure.
Fourth, investors can also opt for customised investment plans. Instead of investing in only one commodity, we can use our algorithms to make investment plans. With this, we can develop a portfolio through which investors invest in a mix of crops and animals or short-term and long-term commodities.
Fifth, we run drones on all our farms daily, meaning that investors can monitor farms that they have investments in every day. Investors can also physically visit the farms at any time.
In a nutshell, investors can go to our platform, select the investment portfolio they want, pay online, relax and watch their investment grow.
FI: The idea for EZ Farming was born on 10 January 2015, how would you describe your progress till date?
AO: Even though the idea for EZ Farming was born on 10 January 2015, the process of getting the right stakeholders across the agriculture value chain to help us scale in Africa requires careful consideration and negotiations. That is what is taking time. For the past three years, I have been building the necessary partnerships and relationships that are important to ensure EZ Farming’s success.
We have recently launched the EZ Farming platform. We started talking to investors in March 2018. We are now active in three African countries: Nigeria, Ghana and Sierra Leone. In Sierra Leone, for example, we are partnering with churches who currently have about 500 unemployed youths and about 10 acres of mango farms that are not well managed. They have an extra 50 acres of land. We want to partner with the landowners in the churches to explore ways to use their resources to create employment for their youths.
EZ Farming is built on the principle of togetherness. For Africa to move forward, one of the key things we need is to embrace the spirit of ‘togetherness.’ This is currently missing in so many ways. The actors in our agricultural value chains are not well-connected. EZ Farming seeks to change this.
We already have about $ 200, 000 in investments and 1, 500 acres of land in partnerships. We want to make sure that arable lands are not left fallow when they can be productively utilised. We are currently discussing land partnerships with Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria to encourage their young graduates interested in agriculture to apply for our internship programs with the land that the university is contributing to the project.
FI: Nigeria is projected to be the third most populous country by 2050, what changes to the food and agriculture sectors would you like to see?
AO: Our goal is to have at least one commercial farm in every local government in the country so that our investors can spread their investments across communities in the country.
We want to create farm beauties on all Nigerian roads.
I remember when I was in primary school, there was a Yoruba chorus that we were taught: Ise Agbe ni ise ile wa, eni ko sise yio ma ja le… It is our goal to bring this back to the minds of young Nigerians. We want to see young people working daily on farms and that is also why we want to create farm beauties along all major roads in the country.
Ultimately, we want to change the narrative of youth unemployment in Nigeria.
To invest or partner with EZ Farming, see here.
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