FACagripreneurs | Future Agro Challenge

APEH OMEDE – FAC GLOBAL IMPACT MAKER INTERVIEW

Name: Apeh Omede
Country: Nigeria
Organisation: Future Agro Challenge Nigeria
Website: www.thegreenrishehub.com

Apeh Omede is the CEO and co-founder at Greenrise Innovation Hub of Nigeria (The GreenRise Hub), which is Nigeria’s premier agri-foodtech specific business innovation hub. He is also the founder of FarmCoach Agro-Services through which he provides information services to small and medium size farmers and farming organisations in Nigeria. Apeh volunteers as a mentor with Thought for Food to support agripreneurs with their business building journey .

One of his most important activities is to advise young farmers on creating sustainable businesses. The biggest opportunities Apeh can see will be creating solutions or promoting innovations that can help increase food production in a sustainable way and this is why Apeh became involved with the Future Agro Challenge.

As an agripreneur ecosystem builder, the greatest challenge is to get stakeholders on board, especially in a society where the focus for these stakeholders and investors is on other areas of the economy. While other non-agriculture ecosystem can easily attract support and funding both from the government and corporate organizations, it may take the agrifood ecosystem twice the time and effort to achieve same. This tends to slow down the pace at which the agrifood ecosystem is growing across the country.

It is in this nexus of securing more support for the agripreneurs in the ecosystem that the Future Agro Challenge comes in. Through the challenge, young agripreneurs have the opportunity to have their businesses showcased to stakeholders and potential investors. It also provides the opportunity for them to receive business mentoring and network with peers and share and exhange ideas to support their businesses.

From working in the ecosystem, I have learned that agripreneurs are daring. They take up a challenge no one bold enough to confront and find a solution to it. By doing that, they bring transformation to the agriculture and food production systems. I have also seen how aginnovation is impacting agriculture positively and proving to be the solution to the challenge of feeding the growing global population.

One thing we are proud of is starting the first agri-foodtech-specific innovation hub in Nigeria. Through our work, we have continued to inspire young agripreneurs in Nigeria to continue to build sustainable agribusinesses in the country.

Apeh’s advice to young entrepreneurs is to focus on developing innovative solutions that truly meet people’s needs and add value to their business. To achieve this, they must learn to work together to use their knowledge collectively and exchange views in order to meet the challenges posed by growing food demand both locally and globally.

 

Create: 

We mobilize local communities to create agro innovation hubs globally

Collaborate:

We facilitate the sharing of ideas and resources to achieve a bigger goal

Cultivate:

We support you so that you can make a positive impact in the world