[Springboard](https://https://springboardnig.com/)

The Problem

Extreme poverty in Nigeria is concentrated in one profession: farming. Most people living on $1 a day are rural farmers. 70 per cent of rural people in Nigeria are smallholder farmers and despite producing some 90 per cent of Nigeria’s food, they still live in abject poverty. Because they lack access to best practices/climate-smart-agriculture and financial literacy education, social capital, agribusiness funding and most importantly, fairtrade markets, they don’t have opportunity to earn sustainable incomes and become economically empowered. Also, the realities of climate change continue to intensify their financial vulnerability. As a result, they (and members of their families) become trapped in multigenerational cycles of severe poverty.

Our Solution

Springboard provides a comprehensive small-scale farmer empowerment program (tagged D2E – Disempowered to Empowered) that addresses the complex drivers of rural farmer poverty and equips them with the resources and skills to run their farms as successful farm businesses and lift themselves out of severe poverty. Our D2E consists of access to a farmers’ Co-op, best practices/climate-smart-agriculture education and financial literacy, Pre-financing, Crop Diversification, Farm extension services and premium/fairtrade markets. Also, utilizing the hub-spoke collection model, Springboard buys 100% of quality produce at fair prices where farmers make a significant margin and also receive fairtrade premiums and dividends on every farm produce thus making our farmers own their produce till it gets to the global supply chain.

Program Outputs

As rural farmers in Nigeria become members of an organized farmers’ co-op, gain knowledge, skills and support through the Springboard’s D2E Co-op program, they are able to run and manage their farms as profitable agri-businesses, increase their yield and incomes and make a sustainable and comfortable living.

Program Outcomes

As the agribusiness and incomes of our rural farmers grow, they have better capacity to provide for their families’ basic needs such as education, health, housing and nutrition. Also, our farmers now have the confidence to act as role models to rural youth to take up farming. Additionally, by using agroforestry and eco farming practices, natural ecosystems are better protected and supported to flourish.

Program Goals

Equipped with sustainable farm businesses and reliable, long-term sources of income, rural farmers in our co-op and their families are now able to permanently get out of poverty and invest in things that really matter: education, nutrition, healthcare, housing and the future of their family – all this contributes to building rural communities free of abject poverty in Nigeria - Africa.

Value Chains

We mainly use Cacao, Plantain/Banana and Edible cricket insects to lift rural people and farmers out of poverty. Also, we have other diversification crops such as Beans, Rice, and vegetables that our farmers grow year-round.

Our Impact

- Over 8000 farmers in our co-op in aroung 100 communities in Nigeria
- Over 100 jobs for people working with us

Springboard in 2 minutes video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHVO-EusrGs&t=3s

Our Newsletters: https://springboardnig.com/blogs/

Springboard Development Initiative Diaspora Fund

Turning banana waste into sustainable products that reduce reliance on plastics and create livelihoods for women and youth.

**Tendo Social Development Group**

**What if agricultural residue could replace synthetic materials, create livelihoods and give young people more choices about their future?**

That question captures what Tendo Social Development Group is working to achieve in Kenya.

Tendo is a Kenyan nonprofit creating sustainable livelihood opportunities for women and young people, particularly in communities where unemployment and limited economic opportunities can make migration feel like the only path to a better life.

Our belief is simple: **“The grass can be green here.”**

We do not seek to discourage migration. We want women and young people to have genuine economic choices—whether they choose to build a livelihood in their community, move elsewhere in Kenya, or migrate internationally.

**From banana residue to beautiful hair**

One of Tendo's most exciting innovations began with something normally left behind after a banana harvest: the **banana pseudostem**.

We are developing fibre extracted from these pseudostems into natural hair extensions. This creates the potential for a new circular value chain:

**BANANA FARMERS → FIBRE → WOMEN & YOUTH → NATURAL HAIR EXTENSIONS → BRAIDERS & SALONS → CONSUMERS**

Following six months of research and development, Tendo has produced a functional, wearable banana-fibre hair extension. Prototypes have been worn and tested by women and have also been worked with and evaluated by professional braiders.

The next challenge is to move from a successful prototype to a consistent, market-ready product.

The environmental opportunity is compelling. Conventional hair extensions rely heavily on synthetic materials. We want to establish how far renewable banana fibre can substitute for these materials while creating productive value from agricultural residue left after the fruit has been harvested.

We are deliberately taking an **evidence-based approach**. Rather than simply describing the product as “green,” “plastic-free” or “biodegradable,” we want to measure and validate its environmental performance—including synthetic-material substitution, banana-residue utilisation, water and energy use, waste recovery, durability and end-of-life options.

**One innovation. Multiple opportunities.**

For **banana farmers**, fibre could create an additional source of value from the banana plant after the fruit has been harvested.

For **women**, opportunities can extend across fibre preparation, treatment and finishing, production, quality control, packaging, distribution, braiding, salon services and enterprise.

For **young people**, the emerging value chain can create opportunities in processing, production, technology, logistics, digital marketing, sales and entrepreneurship.

For the **environment**, the innovation gives us an opportunity to demonstrate whether an agricultural residue can become a commercially useful renewable material that reduces reliance on conventional synthetic fibre.

And for **communities**, viable green enterprises can expand the economic choices available to people who might otherwise migrate primarily because they see few livelihood opportunities closer to home.

**Creating livelihoods. Expanding choices.**

Tendo's work goes beyond banana fibre.

From our programmes in **Kendu Bay in Homa Bay County and Mukuru in Nairobi**, we work with women and young people to develop practical pathways to income through enterprise development, agripreneurship, climate-smart agriculture, production and sales.

We are also working with partners to help young women make safer and better-informed decisions about migration—understanding their rights, assessing risks, comparing the true financial implications of different opportunities and considering viable livelihood pathways closer to home.

Across these activities, our purpose remains the same:

**Create livelihoods. Expand choices. Strengthen communities.**

**What your donation can make possible**

Your support can help us take our banana-fibre innovation from successful R&D to market readiness.

Donations can contribute to product refinement and quality testing; improved fibre processing and pilot production; building a reliable supply chain with banana farmers and cooperatives; expanded testing with consumers, braiders and salons; environmental measurement and validation; more efficient use of water and energy; and preparing women and young people to participate in the emerging value chain.

We believe environmental innovation becomes even more powerful when it also creates economic opportunity.

**A banana plant can create value beyond its fruit. Agricultural residue can become a resource. Women and young people can participate in a new green value chain. And migration can become a choice rather than a necessity.**

**Help us turn agricultural residue into opportunity—for people and for the planet.**

Friends of Tendo Social Development Diaspora Fund

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