ShareLand, Miklah’s Initiative Connecting Farmers to Landowners gets shortlisted for CURAD Incubator program!

Few months ago, we came across CURAD (The Consortium for enhancing University Responsiveness to Agribusiness Development Limited), Uganda’s incubator that is one of the six Agri-business incubators in Africa supported by African union through the Forum for Agriculture Research in Africa, asking for agriculture innovations applications. Well, we @Miklah applied with our great innovation; SHARELAND UGANDA!

ShareLand Uganda, modern farming, and CURAD

Few months earlier, we at Miklah had observed how farming was becoming hard for most of us. While 77% of Ugandans are in agriculture, few of them actually have land. With the notorious land fragmentation, practicing true modern agriculture or farming in Uganda becomes even harder. Sadly, youth and women who form the biggest percentage of those involved in agriculture have no land. Without land, there is no farming! What could possibly go wrong with a country whose backbone is farming, the farming that is now dying? Pretty everything!

So we thought of a solution. We wondered; what if instead of pushing everyone to own land inspire them to connect with those with land? What if instead of a landowner struggling with farming gets connected to someone who is already in love with farming? ShareLand Uganda makes that possible; easily, affordably, and quickly. With ShareLand web and mobile platform, farmers (those interested in farming but have no land) can be connected to landowners (those with land but not interested or no time for farming), thereby establishing mutual partnerships for commercial and subsistence farming.

And this innovation is what we presented to CURAD when they opened up for applications for agriculture-related innovations.

ShareLand Uganda gets shortlisted for CURAD Incubator

Having submitted our application, we waited. Well, thank God, on June 2nd 2021, CURAD got back to us with exciting news; we had been shortlisted. In the email, the selection committee representative, Winnifred Kwala, wrote: ‘Congratulations! We are very happy to inform you that your application for the CURAD National Agribusiness Innovation Challenge 2020/2021 has been shortlisted.’

See the email screenshot below

We thank God and Miklah team for everything good that we do! NB: See CURAD on Twitter!

ShareLand Uganda to for pitching training & pitching at CURAD Incubator.

Following the congratulatory email above, we just waited. The waiting was so long that we at times thought that maybe the program wouldn’t move forward. We contacted them via WhatsApp and we were relieved to be told that the program was still on, and they were looking forward to having all the shortlisted innovations move forward with pitching at some point.

Seen the WhatsApp chat screenshot below.

They kept their word. Just yesterday, 30/07/2021, we received an email inviting us for pitching training and pitching activities. In the email, Moses Katta, the representative of the team, wrote:

‘Congratulations again for making it to this stage. As you may be aware, COVID-19 has affected every one and every Organization. This includes CURAD programmes Such as the innovation challenge. Following the Government of Uganda COVID-19 containment measures, the 2 stages will be online which are: Online pitching training and Online pitching.‘

See the email details in the screenshot below:

And my name on the list of those who shall undergo both the pitch training and pitching (see the screenshot below).

Whether we get selected after pitching or not, this is already a good thing. We wanna thank God who enables all these great innovations at Miklah and the team of Miklah who works it out. And, of course, you, the client who uses our initiatives. We are very grateful. God bless you all.

READ THIS TOO: Miklah Life and Related Innovations selected for Stanbic Business Incubator

We will keep you updated with the pitching exercise and the selection results. For now, chao chao.

UPDATE (30/11/2021): We didn’t manage to be the over-all winner of the award. However, we scored a certificate of participation, and were granted full access to all resources under CURAD program, including space, machinery, internet, and other funding and training opportunities. So, it is just the beginning!