Aisha Raheem

When Aisha Raheem received the Female Ag-Tech Innovator Award at the 2024 WAYA competition, Farmz2U was already operating across Nigeria and Kenya with a small, agile team of 13, all of them youth, and a clear thesis: that the information gap between smallholder farmers and the markets they supply is not a fixed feature of African agriculture, but a solvable problem. Within a year of winning, that thesis had found sharper expression in the world, and the tools to prove it had grown considerably more powerful.

Two platforms, one connected value chain

Farmz2U operates through two core products. Talon is the buyer-facing platform, a digital procurement and supply chain tool that uses predictive analytics to help buyers manage quality control, forecast prices, and secure transactions. Kuju sits at the other end, facing the farmer, giving smallholders the ability to record their cultivation data, track what their produce is worth, set prices, and access markets that previously required a middleman to reach. Within a year of winning the WAYA award, Aisha’s team had integrated the two platforms, connecting the farmer’s record with the buyer’s decision in real time.

The effect was tangible. Farmers organized into clusters, many of them women-led groups and young growers, could for the first time see what buyers were willing to pay, enter negotiations with data behind them, and access premium markets that prioritize traceable and sustainable produce. The integration also gave farmers tools to anticipate demand cycles, reducing the guesswork that typically leads to post-harvest losses. For buyers, the improved supply chain visibility contributed to a 17% increase in profit margins from Talon-managed transactions within the year.

A critical piece of this was reaching farmers who do not have smartphones or reliable internet access. Through a partnership with Africa’s Talking, Farmz2U integrated USSD functionality into Kuju, meaning a farmer with a basic feature phone could receive market updates, agronomic advice, and pricing information through a standard text interface. By the one-year mark, the platform had grown to nearly 3,800 active users, over 1,300 of them women, and over 1,500 living below the poverty line. These numbers reflect a deliberate choice: to build technology that reaches the people who most need it, not just those best positioned to adopt it.

Prize money put to work at the last mile

Aisha directed the WAYA prize money into the areas where it could create the most immediate traction. Two field sales leads were hired in Nigeria to accelerate farmer onboarding. Localized content was developed to make the platforms more accessible across different regions and languages. These were not headline investments, they were the unglamorous, essential work of making a platform real in communities far from any technology hub.

An investor relationship that started as advice

One of the more significant milestones in the year following the award was the evolution of Farmz2U’s relationship with Rippleworks, a US-based nonprofit. What began as a focused three-month advisory engagement on go-to-market strategy and sales operations deepened into something more consequential: Rippleworks chose to invest directly in Farmz2U, bringing not only capital but access to a global network of impact investors and expertise. It is the kind of relationship that does not happen without credibility, and the WAYA recognition was part of the foundation that made it possible.

New roles for women and youth in farming communities

Beyond the platform metrics, the work Farmz2U was doing within farming clusters had created new economic roles in the communities it served. As farmers expanded their cultivation, some bringing dormant land back into production with newly earned profits, demand for mechanized services grew, opening employment for young people as tractor operators and equipment providers. The cluster lead model created a different kind of opportunity: women and youth appointed to coordinate data collection, onboard new farmers, and liaise with buyers now earned both from their own farming and from commissions on cluster transactions. These were not incidental outcomes, they were the design.

Carbon sequestration as a measurable discipline

Farmz2U’s environmental commitments were also moving in a trackable direction. Carbon sequestration per hectare had grown from 1 ton in 2023 to 2 tons in 2024, driven by the promotion of agroforestry, low-tillage methods, and improved soil health practices embedded in the agronomic advice delivered through Kuju. By the one-year milestone, the company was projecting 2.2 tons per hectare, a modest but consistent improvement that reflects the kind of discipline that builds into something significant over time.

A leader in wider demand

The WAYA award also opened speaking platforms that positioned Aisha as a voice in global conversations about agriculture’s digital future. Within the year, she had spoken at the Oxford Africa Business Forum hosted by the Tony Blair Institute and TGI Group, participated in the Global Canopy and IDH Roundtable on Just Transition and Sustainable Sourcing, contributed to the Africa Food Systems Forum workshop on digital infrastructure for smallholder market access, and joined a panel at FAO Investment Days in Rome on investing in youth agrifood jobs. She was also accepted into the Saïd Business School MBA programme at Oxford, where coursework in logistics, supply chain management, and strategy directly sharpened her capacity to lead a scaling business. The recognition cycle that began with WAYA opened into something much larger, a broader platform to advocate, connect, and lead.

What a year of momentum looks like

Aisha’s story in the year following her WAYA win is not one of dramatic transformation, it is one of deliberate, compounding progress. Technology extended further into communities that had never had access to it. A new investment relationship formed from what started as advice. Women in farming clusters found new economic roles and new negotiating power. A founder already working at the intersection of technology and inclusion found wider audiences for what she was building. That is what the Female Ag-Tech Innovator Award looks like when it finds the right hands.