Investment in Agriculture, Growth Mosaic shows the way
Can investors make money in Ghanaian agriculture? That’s the mission of Osu based Growth Mosaic.
Combining the functions of consultant, incubator, and Investment Banker, Growth Mosaic has spent the last seven years actively channeling investment dollars to leading Ghanaian based agriculture and technology startups.
Founded in 2008 by Canadian born Wayne Miranda, Growth Mosaic has grown from a one-person operation to an 18-person staff.
Having scoured all of Ghana for investment opportunities, Growth Mosaic is investigating opening additional offices in Nigeria and the Ivory Coast.
One example of the focus of Growth Mosaic is corn farming. In Ghana, farmers produce significantly less corn per hectare (2 metric tons) than farmers in the USA (10 metric tons) or Europe (8 metric tons).
To solve this, farmers began adding imported fertilizer to their fields. However, the rains just washed away the fertilizer, and yields did not improve.
Enter Farmers Hope, a developer of organic fertilizer, based outside Kumasi. With business and capital raising assistance from Growth Mosaic, Farmers Hope was able to produce a product that was much better suited to growing conditions in Ghana.
According to Acumen Fund, an investor in Farmers Hope, their fertilizer has been proven to produce 60 percent higher yields than regular chemical fertilizers.
Farmers Hope has sold more than 60,000 bags to 4,000 smallholder farmers across rural Ghana.
The company's fertilizer is priced at 50% less than competing products making it affordable to most smallholder farmers.
Farmer's Hope has impacted over 1,500 farmers with plans to reach 25,000 in the next five years.
Other Growth Mosaic investments include Maza, a rural ambulance service, Juaben Oil Mills, which produces sustainable palm oil, and Moringa Connect, a player in the emerging Moringa Oil business.
As a social-purpose business, Growth Mosaic does the hard work to prepare small and growing businesses to access and manage growth investment.
For U.S. or European investors, Growth Mosaic serves the important role of being local, and reducing the execution risks and improve the viability of our clients as investible opportunities. This enables Ghana based agribusinesses to attract growth investment as well as improves deal flow for investors.
As a for profit enterprise, Growth Mosaic has shown that with a lot of hard work and ingenuity, it is possible to help farmers become more successful without NGOs or charity, and still make a profit.
By Richard Liebman