Egyptian agri-fintech startup, Mozare secures over $1M in pre-seed funding from Algebra Ventures
Mozare3, a Giza-based Agri-fintech startup that helps farmers sell their farm produce, has secured an undisclosed seven-figure investment in a pre-seed funding round led by Algebra Ventures and Disruptech Ventures.
EFG-EV and other reputable angel investors also participated in the funding round.
Mozare3 was founded in 2020 by Hussein Abou Bakr, Tamer El-Raghy with support from Mohamed Okasha, the former Managing Director of Egyptian unicorn, Fawry.
The startup has a platform that provides underserved and unbankable smallholder farmers with access to a range of financial products, markets, and agronomy support.
At the moment, most of Mozare3’s work is done offline. However, a small group of farmers is currently beta testing its app.
With the launch of the app set for 2022, the company plans to onboard over 10,000 farmers on its platform.
It would also allow farmers to access credit, receive agronomy support, buy fertilizers and other products to grow crops, and sell their products through its digital offtake agreements.
Hussein Abou Bakr, founder, and CEO of Mozare3 said they intend to change how farmers engage in agriculture.
“Egyptian smallholder farmers have limited access to financing and no direct access to markets. We believe that an agri-fintech platform focused on those farmers, like Mozare3, would revolutionize the way farmers plan, farm, and sell their crops.”
Hussein Abou Bakr has over 20 years of experience in subsistence and commercial farming, food processing, and international trading. Before launching Mozare3, he founded an Agri processor and exporter, Platform, that used to source produce from smallholders in over ten governorates in Egypt.
The startup claims it serves about 20million smallholder farmers with its innovative and highly sought-after financial product offerings.
Tamer El-Raghy, co-founder of Mozare3 explains that the startup provides a service that aims to address existing gaps within the smallholder farmer industry.
“While the Agri sector contributes more than 10% of the GDP and 25% of national employment, farmland is very fragmented with more than 40% of the farms with an area of less than 1 acre. This fragmentation represents an opportunity for an agri-fintech platform, like Mozare3, to bring efficiencies to the supply side, by providing those farmers with innovative financial products, agronomy support, and access to markets, and hence turn those farmers into contract-farmers, to fulfill the growing demand of consumers, processors, and exporters.”
Tarek Assaad, Managing Partner at Algebra Ventures attributes their investment into the startup to the innovative financial products offered in a market that requires a tech-enabled solution.
“The agriculture industry suffers from price opaqueness, supply fragmentation, and high levels of fraud, to name a few of the challenges. We believe that it is one of the segments of the Egyptian economy that can benefit the most from tech efficiencies. We had been looking at making an agritech investment for some time and are delighted to support Hussein and Tamer as they address this massive opportunity. We were impressed by the vision, capabilities, and passion of the Mozare3 team, and we are excited to be part of their journey.”
Over the last few years, the demand for food has increased exponentially in the MENA Region. This demand is linked to population growth and rising income amongst the citizens.
Thus, fusing technology into the agricultural value chain will help improve efficiency and increased sales for smallholder farmers who make about 70% of the farmers in Egypt.