The problem

Climate change has exacerbated water scarcity, soil degradation and erosion, leading to reduced soil fertility and agricultural productivity. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, around 65% of Africa’s agricultural land is affected by some form of soil degradation. This poor soil quality leads to decreased crop yields.

Precision agriculture is an information-intensive approach where production inputs such as fertilizers and water are matched with farm-specific needs of crops.

In Kenya, the majority of the farmer population does not have access to precision agriculture to monitor soil quality due to the high cost of existing soil testing sensors and inaccessible laboratories for soil testing. While these laboratories are based in cities, UjuziKilimo aims to improve affordability and accessibility of soil testing services for remote smallholder farmers.

The company

UjuziKilimo is an agri- tech company that provides a platform advancing data-driven decisions for smallholder farmers by collecting, organising and interpreting agricultural data. The company has developed SoilPal – a device that uses Internet of Things (IoT) sensors to help farmers understand soil health.

Project description

UjuziKilimo will roll out Soil Pal, a proprietary handheld portable device that uses high-sensitive sensors to detect, measure and analyse 13 soil parameters within 5 minutes. These parameters include soil moisture, temperature, acidity levels, salinity levels, levels of macro-nutrients and GPS data.

Farmers will receive SMS recommendations on which carbon-negative and affordable fertilizers to use, the quantity of water and farm chemicals they should apply for a specific crop for better yields. The proposed grant project will focus on assembly of 35 Soil Pal devices and scaling access to soil testing services to 50,000 farmers. This will entail

1) Importation of all hardware components from China (including IoT sensors, electrical units and handheld devices) and

2) Locally assembling these hardware components to build the completed Soil Pal device in Kenya.

Founders

Quote from Founder

“Building to address impacts of climate change on smallholder farmers is about finding the right partners who believe in our mission. The investment from GSMA is not just capital; it’s a vote of confidence in our mission of empowering smallholder farmers to increase their productivity, income and food security, while promoting sustainable practices and preserving the environment.”

Team

15 staff members.