A smallholder is financed as part of a chain, and each link holds a different fact. The input supplier knows what was delivered, the buyer what it has agreed to take, the insurer what is covered, the lender what it has lent. The facts exist; what is missing is a place where they sit together. Our aim is one view of the whole chain, with evidence for every link, so that value chain finance, group finance and the place where the two meet reach the farmers they were designed for.
What we are building, in design and early build and not live yet:
- ●A whole value chain appraised as one case, so the lender sees every link a loan rests on
- ●Village-based agronomists on the ground: with Mwikila beside them they advise farmers and verify the plot, the inputs and the deliveries
- ●Following a financed season as it runs, so a problem is seen while there is still time to act
Today LitFin Intelligence works on agricultural credit files on the lender's side, in English and Swahili. The chain view is a direction and not yet something a lender can use; the decision stays with the lender.