1. Africa Agribusiness Academy
Investing in knowledge for
entrepreneurship
Piet Heemskerk: pam-heemskerk@hetnet.nl

2. Summary
- Entrepreneurship is key to development of food
security
- Learning from own experience – digital platforms and
sharing business cases
- Validation and brokering of knowledge
- Private sector in the lead

3. Background on food security
- 2010: One billion people chronically hungry (265 million
in Africa)
- MDG 1: halving hunger in 2015
- Global consensus on strategy: productivity increase
and market access for small scale farmers
- Limited entrepreneurial knowledge and skills by
operators in agrifood sector
- Our entry point: SMEs in agrifood sector to be drivers for
rural and urban development

4. Starting points
- Focus on entrepreneurship in Africa
- SME’s as ‘pull’ factor and leverage for linking small
farmers to markets
- Enhanced SME activity leads to higher food security
- Build on best practices / business cases
- Business community takes the lead
- Partnering & Networking, Resource center, Education
& Training

5. Africa Agribusiness Academy
- Creating opportunities
- Community of practice
- Business clubs Resource Centre
supporting the network
A vibrant action and
learning network of - Documenting practice
entrepreneurs - Research, policy advice
- Newsletter, Q&A services
- Web based info sharing
Education &
- Coaching trajectories
Training to
- Tailor-made training
enhance
- Internships
business skills
- Business trips

6. African SME champions
- Need for networking, training and knowledge sharing
became apparent
- Partnership Dutch Agribusiness-Sokoine University –
Wageningen UR
- 15 African SME champions agreed to become
founding members
- Group has spin–off to 30,000 small farmers, so high
leverage

7. Organic growth • Tanzania
• Kenya
Focus groups • Uganda
5 champions
+ 15 upstarts
5 champions
+ 15 upstarts
15
champions
5 champions
+ 15 upstarts
Oct 2010 Nov 2011
May 2010 Mar 2011

8. Next steps
- Kick-off workshop (May 2010): entrepreneurial spirit
among founding members
- Business plan 2010-11: agreed upon by founding
members,
- Launch (Nov 2010): prepare and start implementing
action plans
- Expanding from 15 to 400 members, tailor-made
trainings, resource base
- Going to Scale event: business planning 2012-2015

9. Africa Agribusiness Academy
“Home grown entrepreneurship”
“Investing in knowledge for entrepreneurship”
For more information, please contact:
Mr. Bram Huijsman, Wageningen University & Research
Centre, The Netherlands
Tel: (+31) 6 5138 1215
Mail: bram.huijsman@wur.nl