Mibagu, a new social media platform for farmers, small business owners, and entrepreneurs, was recently launched.
Mibagu was founded to connect entrepreneurs and investors, according to founder Roseline Tosun.
This platform also serves as an information hub for farmers and entrepreneurs, with the goal of promoting and strengthening farming and agriculture.
“The name of the website means ‘to tell each other. I created the site to bring entrepreneurs together,” Tosun says.
She says the platform enables farmers to sell their products and meet the needs of both suppliers and consumers.
“If a person wants to know if there are fruit, vegetables or even farming equipment for sale, they have to search every day, but with Mibagu the only things sold on their marketplace will be what a farmer or gardener typically sells,” she says.
Tosun says the platform was not only created to benefit businesses but also farmers due to the economic hardships they are currently faced with.
The farmers’ market on Mibagu was created to give local farmers more exposure with the hope that this would motivate more people to venture into crop production.
“With the war going on in Ukraine, food prices have skyrocketed, and this has a colossal impact on the livelihoods of the Namibian people,” Tosun says.
She says while Namibia imports products like wheat, bulgur and maize, produce such as sorghum, maize, potatoes, cabbages, grapes, carrots, spinach, beetroots, prickly pears can be successfully grown locally.
“Growing food in Namibia’s hot climate can be a challenge, but with the help of greenhouses and climate crop selection techniques it is possible to successfully grow food in Namibia,” she says.
Tosun encourages farmers to use the platform to enable them to grow and develop the farming sector on a larger platform to connect farmers with various investors and entrepreneurs.
“Mibagu.com is a platform for innovation and success. It is also a space where farmers can have support groups for farming with specific breeds of animals and specialised food production techniques like permaculture,” she says.
Tosun says: “Besides individuals selling their produce through marketplace posts, we also hope farming communities use the events feature to promote regular physical farmers’ markets.”
