Agriculture & Microenterprise Development

Women’s Nutribusiness Project
Women In Development

Project Objective: The goal of the Women’s Nutribusiness project is to increase the agricultural productivity of smallholder women farmers while increasing local food security and improving the nutritional status of vulnerable individuals in the local areas. The project implementers

Activities:

• Mobilization of women's groups into nutrition cooperatives and construction of food processing facilities equipped with milling machines, dehullers and solar dryers.
• Development of Nutri-porridge products based on local produce and with enhanced nutitional value.
• Training of women entrepreneurs in food processing. 
• Development of participatory decision making and democratic systems
• Product commercialization 
• Human Resource Development 
• Establishment of two more Cooperatives, in Mbeere and Makueni districts as replicates of the successful Bomet and Murang’a Cooperatives

Results to date:

• Two cooperatives, one in Bomet district and the other in Murang’a district have been established with over 1,500 shareholders and are fully equipped and functional with permanent processing plants,  milling machines, dehullers and solar dryers.
• Two nutri-porridge products, Tupcho Mixed porridge developed in Bomet and, BASCOT in Murang’a are out in the market.
• Over 30 training workshops have been conducted for Bomet and Murang’a Cooperative shareholders and about 20 students from Kenya and the US. Both graduate and undergraduate have developed research papers on the project. 
• Two more cooperatives have been established in Makueni and Mbeere districts as replicates of the Bomet and Murang’a Cooperatives.

Partners:  The Universities of Pennsylvania,Tuskegee and Nairobi; the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI), and Community Based Organizations (CBOs)