Across many developing markets, farmers of all types struggle to find fair pricing and straightforward trading practices, as middlemen along the supply chain tend to complicate dealings and add costs.
South Africa-based Nile operates a marketplace aimed at simplifying this process by digitizing interactions and, through its online marketplace, facilitating more direct relationships between farmers, suppliers, and buyers.
This enables farmers to negotiate fairer prices for their products and to reach customers faster.
Cofounder Louis de Kock experienced supply chain inefficiency and fragmentation first-hand growing up on. a farm in South Africa.
In response, he and the rest of the Nile crew “set out to build an online marketplace that would enable farmers to trade transparently and at a lower cost, while limiting the amount of food waste through the supply chain,” de Kock tells AgFunderNews.
Starting initially as a marketplace for produce sales, Nile has since evolved into a full agribusiness platform that offers everything from fertilizer to financing. Farmers can not only trade produce across multiple regions, but also directly access supplies from manufacturers thanks to Nile’s Inputs Marketplace.
Companies such as Nile are in AgFunder’s Ag Marketplaces & Fintech investment category, which grew 77% in developing markets in 2024, according to AgFunder data. [Disclosure: AgFunderNews’ parent company is AgFunder.]
With a total funding of $561 million across 96 deals, the category represented 49% of all upstream funding in developing markets in 2024.
As de Kock explains below, this is to be expected, given the given the fragmented nature of most developing nations’ agricultural industries.
AgFunderNews (AFN): What motivated you to start the company?
Louis de Kock (LDK): I grew up on a vegetable farm in central South Africa. It was apparent that the way fresh produce is traded through traditional markets, with multiple layers of intermediaries between farmers and end consumers, is exactly the same as the way my grandfather traded produce, despite all the technological and logistical advances.
We set out to build an online marketplace that would enable farmers to trade transparently and at a lower cost, while limiting the amount of food waste through the supply chain.
AFN: What are the top services you offer farmers?
LDK: What began as a marketplace for streamlining fresh produce sales has evolved into a comprehensive digital farmer ecosystem.
Today, Nile offers agricultural supplies, financing, and data services all under one platform. Farmers can seamlessly manage their entire agricultural cycle—from ordering seeds and fertilizer for planting to procuring packaging materials post-harvest—with financing enabled through Nile’s banking partnerships.
The platform’s integrated approach allows farmers to sell their harvested crops through Nile’s marketplace to local and international buyers, guided by comprehensive data services, with the option to receive instant payment upon delivery.
AFN: In which African markets do you currently operate?
LDK: We connect farmers based in Southern Africa, with buyers across Africa using road, air and sea freight. The key markets are in East and West Africa. We also have buyers in the Middle East and South East Asia trading on the platform.
AFN: What excites you most about Africa’s agrifoodtech future?
LDK: We are excited by how quickly farmers are embracing a digital way of trading, which is very different from traditional markets.
We have also found that once farmers are comfortable trading within our ecosystem, we are able to offer other complementary products that are beneficial to farmers. This creates loyalty and stickiness, which reinforces the business model.
>>For more in-depth research about African agrifoodtech and other developing markets, check out AgFunder’s research here.
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