Digital Tech Empowers Ghanaian Cashew Farmer

Women smiling and posing whilst holding cashew plants

Olam Direct purchasing app adds funds and cuts expenses.

 

An estimated 5,400 Ghanaian smallholder farmers are receiving better prices on their 3,100 tons of cashew thanks to Olam’s direct purchasing app Olam Direct. The app also benefits customers by providing greater traceability for their purchasing.

 

Developed in-house, Olam Direct is one part of a robust, proprietary solution which offers a variety of apps and tools to not only provide greater transparency on pricing, but access to agri-inputs and farming advice like better fertiliser use and insights on efficient land use to fight climate change.

The app is empowering farmers to get prices directly from Olam rather than from the traditional buying agents, which yields not only higher prices for their cashew but cost savings on their expenses, as Olam manages “last mile” collection. This can have significant impact on farmers and their communities: if the average daily food budget for a typical Ghanaian household was is 14-15 Cedi ($2.40 - $2.58), farmers using the app can receive funds worth another month of food.