Aquarech

The problem

Fluctuating water temperature as a result of climate change has made it difficult for fish farmers to adapt to knowing when and how much to feed their stock. Fish, including Tilapia which make up the majority of fish found in Lake Victoria in Western Kenya are sensitive to water temperatures and only eat when water is at certain temperature ranges. In absence of the AquaRech’s IoT solution, fish farmers would need to manually check water temperatures, which is cumbersome and not accurate. Without knowledge on precision farming practices, fish farmers are often left guessing when and how much to feed to provide to their stock, this often leads to longer production cycles of fish and smaller stock, leading to lower incomes for fish farmers who sell fish based on weight. This has led to reduced supply of fish in the local market leaving women and youth unable to access fish constantly for trade. We are targeting small holder fish farmers as well as women and youth who are primarily fish traders for our solution.​

The company

Aquarech is a science backed agriculture tech company that leverages mobile technology to improve fish farmers productivity, enable market access and create an inclusive aquaculture value chain in Kenya​

Project description

• Increase the current pilot of farmers using IoT devices from 10 to 50 farmers.
• Enhance AquaRech’s mobile app for fish traders to place orders for high quality fish feeds and record data on water temperatures, amount of feed being fed to stock, frequency and mortality. This will enable farmers to better track patterns and improve output and productivity.​
• Develop a USSD platform for fish farmers to be able to purchase fish feeds and sign up for Aquaculture tips and allow fish traders without smart phones to still be able to purchase fish stock with transparency in pricing.​
• AquaRech will also establish cold chain fish outlets to give fish traders the transparency of how much and where fish are available for collection directly from AquaRech’s fish depots.​

Founder and Co-Founder

• Dave Okech  – Founder

• James Odede – Co-Founder

Quote from Founder

Aquarech is at the forefront of aquaculture innovations to transform fish farmer livelihoods across Kenya. Strengthening the fish value chain and spearheading sustainable, environment-friendly practices buoys all actors involved. Funding from the GSMA Innovation Fund will be the catalyst for us to achieve vertical coordination between our game-changing technology, fish farmers and fish traders, increasing their climate resilience.

Orgnaisation size:

19 staff members.