Marketing Strategy Helps Client Obtain Essential Funding

Kwithu Kitchen is a company with a social mission. Located in Malawi, Kwithu Kitchen is a 100% women-owned cooperative to provide improved livelihoods to rural women. The company started by processing tomatoes including tomato puree and chopped tomatoes, and recently received approval from the Malawi Bureau of Standards to sell tomato sauce and tomato jam. Furthermore, in a very short period of time, the company has quickly become one of the country’s largest honey processors and suppliers. Despite the early adoption of Kwithu Kitchen products in the community, the company still struggles to reach profitability.

“Kwithu Kitchen has enormous potential,” said John Keys, business advisor for Kwithu Kitchen. “PFS’s broad and extensive network of volunteers in a range of disciplines was very attractive to us. With one partner, we could get help help in a variety of areas.” To help Kwithu Kitchen gain a better understanding of their market, guide production, and develop marketing strategies to improve business growth, DSM’s Angela Bowman and Swayam Kher signed up to support a honey and tomato research project.

“I have been a senior analyst for business insights within DNP at DSM for the last seven years and am based out of India,” said Swayam. “I joined PFS because I wanted to share my learnings and knowledge with African clients who can improve food security, build better products, and serve customers with a good purpose.” Together, Swayam and Angela suggested a framework and established milestones for the project so the client could focus their efforts on developing key business tools such as a website, sell sheets and the Kwithu Kitchen “story.”

“Kwithu Kitchen has definitely seen the benefits of our marketing strategy project,” said John. “The volunteer’s advice was critical as we updated our website, produced more engaging collateral material, and thought through our retail supermarket marketing and advertising strategies and plans. What we appreciated most about Angela and Swayam is that they were able to take their experiences working with huge multinational corporations and distill their personal and company’s best practices to a much smaller company like Kwithu Kitchen.”

Angela, who is a Regional Key Account Manager in the Early Life Nutrition Segment at DSM, said it was rewarding to see the enthusiasm of the Kwithu Kitchen staff and the progress they were making in selling their products. “It can be easy to get caught up in our daily personal and professional lives,” said Angela. “My experience with PFS was a refreshing reminder that there is a larger world out there with opportunities to connect with others for the greater good.”

In part, because of Angela and Swayam’s support on the marketing research and strategy project, Kwithu Kitchen was able to update their marketing plans and financial forecasting methods, which are the basis for their updated five-year sales and cash-flow plan. This plan helped the company secure a concessional loan for approximately $90,000 at a 10% interest rate (commercial interest rates in Malawi often exceed 25%), so securing this subsidized loan is critical in helping Kwithu Kitchen secure essential capital requirements.

“We want to be a major financial and economic force in Malawi that can help increase the incomes of more than a thousand beekeepers and smallholder farmers and at the same time become a socially responsible and profitable company,” said John. “We are extremely grateful to PFS and its network of volunteers. Please keep an eye on us – you will be proud of where we end up!”

PFS Volunteer Visits Client, Then Hits the Dance Floor at First-ever PFS Wedding

When Niels van Mossevelde signed up to volunteer with PFS he knew he wanted to work with a client in Kenya. That’s because his good friend had recently moved there and Niels wanted to learn more about the country and its people. 

A scientist with DSM, Niels was matched with Simba Mfalme Millers in Nairobi to serve as their client lead, acting as a project manager for all of the different PFS services that the client is engaged in. “I do project management in my job and it’s a good thing to develop further, especially across different time zones, working with different cultures, working with different realities on the ground,” he said.

After two years as their client lead, Niels visited Simba Millers while in Kenya late last year and was able to see that the recommendations that PFS volunteers had made were implemented and have made a significant impact on their production capacity. There had been a bottleneck in the production line because of mismatched equipment. The volunteer team recommended a new conditioning tank be installed to fix the issue and the client has now purchased the tank, shown behind Niels in the photo above. “He had a conditioning tank that was maybe one twentieth of the total capacity of the rest of the plant…it's an intervention that actually works and he’s now had a capacity increase of I think about 30 percent.

For Niels, the opportunity to meet in person was special.  “I’ve known John [the client] for a couple of years now but seeing someone and shaking their hand is a whole different thing…being there, seeing the whole setup and seeing the improvements he made after our project was really great,” he said. “Seeing that he is working incrementally toward good manufacturing practices, through the certifications he wants, and to professionalize the company further, that’s really awesome.”

In addition to the client visit, the timing of Niels’ trip to Kenya coincided with two other very important events in Kenya. The wedding of his friend who had moved there, and the very first PFS wedding. 

Three years ago, Faith Ngila and Chenge Wandabwa both started new jobs at PFS as program associates in Nairobi on the same day. In their roles they work closely with volunteers and help them through every part of the volunteer journey. For Chenge that has included working with Niels. It also led to another wedding for Niels to attend in Kenya.

"Faith and I met when we both started our jobs at PFS on the same day, so our wedding was truly the first 'PFS' wedding,” said Chenge. “It was very special to have one of our PFS volunteers, Niels van Mossevelde, attend our wedding in Kenya. It was such a special day, and everyone especially enjoyed his dancing!" 

“It was magnificent. I was very honored to be invited. The first day I arrived, Chenge and I went to his tailor to get measurements to get a Kitenge suit made.“ said Niels, describing the colorful fabric of Africa. “I attended with the group of PFS staff from the US and Kenya and it was like being part of the PFS family. At the wedding we had lunch and then you go straight for dancing for the rest of the afternoon. I tried my best, but still some people laughed at my moves. The aunties and the grandmas laughed. I had great fun and that didn’t bother me at all,” he said with a smile.  

You never know where PFS volunteering can lead you.

Last week, Jeff Dykstra, Kojo Amoo-Gottfried of Cargill, and Purbita Ray of General Mills joined Global Minnesota for a panel discussion on food security. They shared how PFS clients have been seriously impacted by supply chain challenges, inflation, and the devastating invasion of Ukraine, and how PFS helps them mitigate those shocks. "The ripple effects of fuel prices or being able to import the raw materials you need, whether that be packaging or food materials like wheat that come from regions like Ukraine, we're seeing hit these companies hard and ultimately that means higher-priced food for the people who can least afford it," said Jeff.

Click HERE to learn more about how Minnesota food giants Cargill and General Mills are helping strengthen the African food system through their partnership with Partners in Food Solutions.

With its population set to double by 2050, Africa is the fastest-growing continent in the world and is on track to hold more than 25% of the world’s total population. As the continent continues to grow and industrialize, ensuring food safety has never been more important. Africa currently suffers from the world’s highest per capita rate of food-borne illness, resulting in 91 million acute illnesses and more than one hundred thousand deaths each year. To ensure safe food for communities across Africa, food processing companies are implementing advanced food safety measures such as Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP), Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) and ISO 22000 food safety management systems.

One company that recently underwent this process was PFS client Rabboni Group in Uganda. Rabboni Group is a maize milling company located in Mukono District, Uganda. They’re eager to grow and supply local and global communities with healthy and safe products. However, the company lacked food safety management prerequisites that are required for any food processing company intending to access bigger markets. The
company chose to work with Partners in Food Solutions and its expert volunteer network for support.

Helping Rabboni Group to improve their food safety was Cargill Food Safety, Quality and Regulation Director Jayd Kittelson. With more than 17 years of industry experience, Jayd was the perfect person to help Rabboni Group reach its goals. “Throughout my career, I’ve gained a lot of exposure to best practices in the food safety space,” said Jayd. “Projects like this allow me to share my food processing knowledge with others who need it, as well as learn myself.”

For several months, Jayd and the project team worked together with Rabboni Group to understand their old processing systems, review GMP pre-requisites, and develop food safety program templates and manuals that would guide the company toward achieving additional food safety certifications. Since the project closed earlier this year, company operations have greatly improved, according to Wabulembo Fazil, a quality controller at Rabboni Group. “We started with personal hygiene and sanitation improvements, and have continued to upgrade the maintenanc of the site and structures guided by the GMP documentation created by the PFS volunteers. The pest control program has provided our company with a lot of savings.”

Rabboni Group now has its sights set on achieving additional food safety certifications including HACCP and ISO 22000, which Jayd and the volunteer team have already agreed to support. “I have worked on many PFS projects in the past and I continue to be impressed with the talent within the food safety and quality space in Africa,” said Jayd. “I keep volunteering because I am inspired by the entrepreneurial spirit of PFS clients and their passion for improvement.”

Palm oil is a staple ingredient used across Rwanda and Africa, serving as an essential ingredient in popular dishes like Nigerian jolif rice and Ivorian sticky alloco plantains. Africa consumes significantly more palm oil than it produces, importing nearly 8 million tons of palm oil in 2020 to meet demand. What was once one of the cheaper cooking oils, is now rivaling other oils like sunflower and soy with prices continuing to rise due to food system shocks like supply chain challenges and the Russia-Ukraine conflict. This volatility in availability and price puts a spotlight on the challenges of depending on imported cooking oil and emphasizes the need to increase Africa’s own production capacity.

Cooperative Le Palmier based in Kigali, Rwanda is helping ensure African consumers have access to affordable and safe palm oil. Established in 2015, Cooperative Le Palmier produces refined palm oil and sells it to supermarkets in the city as well as local rural markets. “In order to meet the growing demand for cooking oil across Africa, we needed assistance in improving our operations and the safety of our products,” said Mr. Rumiya Kamari, managing director of Cooperative Le Palmier. “Partnering with PFS gave us access to the right experts to do that.”

Yenny Lizarazo, a food safety and quality supervisor, has been working at Cargill for five years and is responsible for ensuring that products that leave the plants meet the food safety standards required by its customers. “My main motivation for volunteering with PFS is to gain an experience that allows me to do something different from my daily work and help others,” said Yenny. “Working with Cooperative Le Palmier gave me the opportunity to learn about oil production. And although the regulations are similar, there were some differences so I had to learn about their processes specifically, which was a fun learning experience for me.”

By working together, Yenny and Cooperative Le Palmier have been able to put together the necessary documentation needed to do fortification of Cooperative Le Palmier’s palm oil and have improved its operations and the safety of its product. “As most of our staff are not skilled enough in GMP and quality control, Yenny has been a great resource with her expertise and experience in developing different documentation which is currently being used in our operations,” said Mr. Rumiya. “We now have a better understanding of the food processing framework compared to before and believe this is a strong base for growth.”