Buko Ventures is excited to invest in Mayani, an agri-tech platform in the Philippines helping farmers increase their earnings and customers access high-quality and affordable agriculture.

As a tropical country with lots of rainfall and rich volcanic soil, the Philippines produces an abundance of delicious high-quality fruits and vegetables in addition to a long history of rice farming, pork and poultry production, and of course fishing off the coasts of the country's 7,000+ islands. However, the route to market from the farm or fish nets to the end-customer has always been long and expensive with lots of intermediaries and spoilage along the way. Even once the produce reaches the cities, wholesalers need to actually find clients for their stocks before each box of sweet delicious mangos turns brown. All of these challenges together mean that in many cases the final consumer price per kg is 10x more expensive than the price the farmer was paid for his harvest - often called the "farmgate price."

Mayani is using technology to bring better efficiency to the agriculture supply chain for the benefit of both farmers and end-customers. Mayani builds relationships directly with the producers to source high-quality products. One of the co-founders Ochie San Juan is actually a farmer and agriculture professor with 30 years of experience. Mayani's platform then provides an easy experience for businesses to buy the food products they need. By matching supply and demand directly, the farmers capture more of the value of their harvest, the customer gets fresh food at good prices, and less food is wasted along the way.

It's a particularly difficult challenge because the Philippines farming landscape is incredibly fragmented with over 5 million small-scale farms across the country. Over 85% of Philippines farms are under 3 hectares in size and the majority are under 1 hectare (about the size of 1.5 football fields). By comparison, in wealthier countries, average farms are typically over 50 hectares. The demand side for food is similarly fragmented with the economy still largely comprised of SMEs. At the same time, as incomes continue to grow, food consumption will increase and demand for high-quality produce in particular will accelerate so building an efficient food supply chain is extremely important and valuable for the country.

The Mayani team is off to a great start and is already the leading B2B agri-tech platform in the Philippines with supply-side relationships with over 15,000 farmers, and demand-side relationships with some of the top businesses in the country like UCC Coffee, WalterMart and Healthy Options grocery stores, and Shell Gasoline for their network of gas station convenience stores. Mayani has already processed over $450,000 USD of GMV to date with strong growth in recent months. In addition to Buko Ventures, Mayani already has great support from Asian Development Bank, which is based in the Philippines and has an impressive history of agricultural development projects around the region, and a partnership with the Philippines Department of Trade & Industry to support the Philippines' agriculture industry.

Mayani's co-founder & CEO JT Solis is very passionate about the opportunity to bring e-commerce technology to the agriculture industry. He also started Mayani with solid previous tech and business development experience in the Philippines and has built strong sales relationships with many of the top corporate accounts in the country.

We see big potential in the agri-tech space in the Philippines and we are very excited to support JT and Mayani in their mission to empower small-holding farmers and bring powerful technology to the agriculture supply chain in the Philippines.