We're proud to announce the Design to Improve Life Fund's latest investment in Wefarm as part of an €11.7M (USD 13M) Series A round.
The platform, an Index Award 2017 Finalist, connects small-scale farmers to vital agricultural information, and today has more two million users.
“We're building an ecosystem for global small-scale agriculture, on behalf of farmers,” CEO of Wefarm Kenny Ewan told TechCrunch. “This is probably the biggest industry on Earth, accounting for some 75-80% of the global supply chain, and yet no one has built anything for them. This is significant on many levels.”
The mission-driven company aims to support the roughly 500 million small-scale farms, run by more than 1 billion farmers, who produce commercial crops like rice, coffee, cattle or vegetables. While it's estimated that these farmers produce the majority of the world’s food, they're also the most isolated when it comes to accessing crop information.
"It's nothing short of fundamental to both improve the livelihoods of farmers while contributing to the future of global food security."
Wefarm aims to bridge this knowledge gap, without users requiring internet access. When farmers encounter a problem, they can pose questions via text message to the local Wefarm number. The request is then processed and sent out to select members of the messaging community, and a useful answer is returned within minutes.
The platform's latest service, a marketplace enabling farmers to buy high-quality products and services, generated approximately €902K (USD 1M) in its first eight months. A milestone achieved faster than both Amazon and eBay in their early stages.
The latest round brings the total raised by the company to €18M (USD 20M), which is led by True Ventures, with AgFunder and June Fund; previous investors include LocalGlobe, ADV and Norrsken Foundation among others.
"We're thrilled to be investing in Wefarm ― it's nothing short of fundamental to both improve the livelihoods of these farmers while contributing to the future of global food security," says Liza Chong, CEO of The Index Project, behind the Design to Improve Life Fund. "We look forward to seeing their success grow and impact scale with the latest investment."
Long term, WeFarm aims to provide a place where small-holding farmers can exchange goods with each other or sell on what they're producing.
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Image: Emre Gencer
