Overview:

Beans Enterprises and Structured Trade in East African Community (BESTEAC) was a 3year project sub granted by the UKAID funded programme ‘FoodTrade East and Southern Africa (ESA) with a focus on establishing trading systems that can build the confidence of large buyers such as exporters, processors and large institutions, who hesitate to depend on local smallholders for supplies.

The project objective:

The main objectives of the project were:

1. To expand structured trade of 30,000 MT/year of beans produced by between 10,000 – 15,000 SHFs in the EAC; and
2. to operate commercial production enterprises that are profitable and become consistent, reliable and competitive suppliers of raw and/ or semi-processed beans to medium and large scale/bulk buyers and/or processors serving national, regional and international markets.

Project Outputs:

1. Ten to fifteen commercially viable and sustainable business consortia (anchored on dedicated “Lead Firms”), each connecting 1,000 – 1,500 farmers to specific end-markets of beans, as well as the necessary and sufficient business partners to adequately respond to the market opportunities.
2. Increased supply, efficiency and cost-effectiveness of the necessary and sufficient business support services (such as market information, business skills, financial services) to support needs of different actors along the bean value chain to deliver their part in the business partnerships for structured trade; and
3. Market-driven increase in quantity, aggregation and quality of beans produced by the SMSFs in each consortium.

What has been achieved:

• BEST-EAC project established 13 consortia led by the following private sector partners:

1. In Kenya: Yash Commodities Ltd, Cheptarit Star Limited, Zero Two Heroes Ltd, Mwailu Enterprises Ltd
2. In Tanzania: Raphael Group Ltd, Kaderes Peasants Development (KPD) PLC, Tamagrasai Ltd
3. In Rwanda: Harvest Plus, SARURA Commodities Ltd
4. In Uganda: Ayella Pe Agro Services Ltd, Equator Seeds Ltd, Farmers’ Center Uganda (FACE)

• Over 13 consortia were formed integrating 11,299 farmers, 12 off-takers, 14 seed companies, 7 Commercial Banks, 10 extension service providers and 9 Local government offices.
• Over20,000MT volumes of produce traded i.e.19,883MT of beans, Sorghum – 550MT Cowpeas –80MT, Soy beans – 15MT and Groundnuts - 7MT.
• OverUSD70,000 worth of loans was accessed directly by the farmers.
• Over 11,000 farmers (5,383males and 5,916 females) and 135 Farmer Business Organizations, 13 lead firms and 14 seed companies accessed improved market information.
• Over5,700 farmers (3,850 males and 1,831 females) accessed improved storage facilities, including warehouse receipt and supplier credit services.
• Over 1,600MT of improved inputs accessed by farmers i.e. 488 MT Seeds of seed, 115 MT of fertilizer, 741 MT of manure and 284 MT of soil lime. These were accessed by 8,097 SHFs (4,216 males and 3,881 females).
• Over300 in-depth farmer specific soil analysis reports produced and disseminated to SHFs i.e. 64 in Kenya, 52 in Rwanda, 148 in Tanzania and 79 in Uganda.
• Over 8,000 farmers (3,881 females and 4,216 males) received BEST-EAC supported trainings on Farmer Business School, Good Agricultural Practices, Post-Harvest Handling, Integrated Soil fertility management and Integrated Pest Management.

Contact Person:

Anthony Mugambi - amugambi@kilimotrust.org