Kosmos pledges support to develop agric

Kosmos Energy, Ghana, has reiterated its commitment to partner the country in its development goals, especially towards whipping up the interest of young people in agriculture.

Through its flagship social investment programme – Kosmos Innovation Centre (KIC) – the company would empower young graduates to innovatively create and apply commercial solutions to the country’s development challenges, starting with agriculture, he said.

Commenting on the 2017 edition of KIC, the Vice-President and Country Manager of Kosmos Energy, Mr Joe Mensah, said the programme aimed at inspiring another 25 AgriTech Business Teams to compete by putting forward innovative solutions to improve the agricultural sector.

AgriTech represents teams of young graduates from different backgrounds who will use information and communications technology (ICT)-facilitated solutions to commercially solve a challenge in agriculture.

The AgriTech Business Teams who are competing for grants, as part of the KIC programme, have embarked on a series of research tours across six regions to enable them to validate their business plans.  After a two-day AgriTech Exchange workshop.

“We are encouraged by the huge response we have received from young entrepreneurs during this second season, availing themselves to endless opportunities in the agriculture sector,” Mr Mensah said.

 AgriTech Business Teams

According to Kosmos, the first trip was arranged to give the entrepreneurs a feel of the agricultural landscape and the opportunity to interact with seasoned chief executive officers and staff of 14 institutions across the agricultural value chain in the country. 

This was followed by an AgriTech Exchange workshop, a two-day event, during which competing teams interacted and held brainstorming sessions, as well as mini pitches on their business plans.

The company said the event brought together a mix of Ghanaian agribusiness representatives, local technology specialists and financial institutions.

In addition, the teams also met a group of senior mentors to educate them on how to use technology innovations to address the needs of Ghana’s agricultural sector.

 Priorities

During the sessions, key stakeholders identified and prioritised a number of areas such as on-farm production and post-harvest challenges, technical and market information for farmers and agro processes, finance and insurance, as well as the ability to track food sources.

Mr Mensah said the young entrepreneurs were currently on another market research tour that would serve as an exercise to validate business plans developed in response to the challenges identified at the AgriTech Exchange.