Have you ever wondered how you can take advantage of social media to commercialize your farming activities? Well, episode 4 of TheAccidental Farmer podcast features Noah Nasiali, an agri-tech innovator and social entrepreneur who founded Afarmers TV, Africa’s rstonline agri-tech TV station. The conversation with host, Joe Okelo covers Noah’s journey in agriculture, the challenges farmers face,and his insights on successful farming practices.

Noah entered agriculture after observing challenges faced by his father-in-law (a tomato farmer) and his own father (a sugar canefarmer). With a background in technology, he initially aimed to build tech solutions for farmers. Using design thinking, he decided tobecome a farmer himself to better understand the challenges rsthand, which has now been a 17-year journey.

Key Challenges in Kenyan Agriculture

Information Gap: Noah highlights the disconnect between excellent agricultural policies at the government level and the smallholderfarmers who lack awareness of these policies.

Market Access Problems: He shares a personal story of planting 75,000 cabbages and failing to sell them, despite having a contract.This experience taught him the importance of understanding markets before production.

Broker Dependency: Farmers are often at the mercy of brokers who determine prices, unlike in countries like South Africa where morestructured systems exist.

Soil Health Ignorance: Many farmers don’t test their soil, leading to declining yields despite fertilizer use. Noah became an Africa SoilHealth Ambassador after discovering the importance of soil testing.

Africa Farmers Club and Afarmers

TVAfter his cabbage failure, Noah created the Africa Farmers Club Facebook group to connect farmers and share knowledge. Initiallyaiming for 1,000 members, the group grew to 16,000 in three months and later to 60,000+ members. During COVID-19, he transformedthis into Afarmers TV when in-person farm visits became impossible.