September 05, 2022

Business is Booming! Young Malian Entrepreneur Flourishes in Rice Threshing

Staple Crops

Mali

In a region where rural exodus and traditional gold panning are in vogue for youth, finding a path to entrepreneurship remains a challenge for many young people. In the village of Boundo, located in the Office du Niger zone in Mali, Kobogoba Diarra is a young man with the ambition to transform his future. In previous years, after the agricultural season, he went to the capital city to work as a butcher in Bamako.

In the local culture, young people head for the big cities even before the end of the agricultural season. Nowadays, venturing to the gold mining sites has become the great dream of many of them, despite the enormous risks. However, a few years ago, Kobogoba decided otherwise. After production, he waits for the harvest season to do rice threshing, an activity that has changed his living conditions.

The village of Boundo is a leading rice producing area. Many of the local farmers are members of the SIGUIDA YEELEN union, our partner that aims to improve the availability of white and parboiled rice for local consumption.

As part of this partnership, Kobogoba and 150 other young people, 35% of whom are women, have benefited from a number of training sessions by 2SCALE on life skills training and identification of job opportunities. This training gave him a desire for entrepreneurship. Afterwards, he set up his rice threshing group in which he employs other young people on a seasonal basis. Since he could not afford a thresher the young entrepreneur uses the family threshing machine to carry out his activity in exchange for a share of his income. He explains:

I have agreed with my family members to give up one third of my earnings as a rental fee for the threshing machine, and I also pay for the maintenance and repair costs.

Changing the payment methods

During the harvest period, producers usually face financial difficulties. It is only after the sale of the first crops that they have cash. However, for Kobogoba, this is not an obstacle for his business; because during the youth training, he also learned negotiation techniques. He quickly used this knowledge to his advantage by proposing to the farmers to pay for his service in kind. This way, he benefits from immediate payment and avoids the constraints of cash payments on credit. One out of every 10 bags of paddy rice is the price to pay for the young entrepreneur's threshing services. With a production of more than 1500 bags, Kobogoba makes more than 150 bags of paddy rice per campaign. He adds:

At the beginning, I had difficulty reaching 100 bags of paddy rice per season, but today we have at least 150 bags at the end of the season, which represents 15,000 FCFA ($23) per bag.

Another advantage he gets from this activity is the straw and bran of rice collected after threshing, which he uses to feed his five cows. Indeed, to maximize his sources of income, Kobogoba has invested in beef cattle breeding.

A contribution to the employability of rural youth

The threshing service offered by the young Kobogoba is not only a job opportunity for himself, but for other young people to whom he also gives temporary employment.

During each campaign, I recruit six young people in order to reach a result of at least 1500 bags.

At the end of the season, Kobogoba sells his bags of paddy on the local market and makes a profit of about 750,000 FCFA ($1,166) per season. Like any businessman, he uses part of income to pay his employees. A part is used for the rent and maintenance of the thresher, the rest is for himself.

The great ambitions of a young entrepreneur

For Kobogoba, working with the family threshing machine is certainly an advantage, but not sustainable in an entrepreneurial spirit. Since the end of the previous season, he has committed to saving money, investing much of his earnings in the breeding of cattle, with the end goal of getting enough capital to buy a threshing machine.

Kobogoba's ambition is to offer threshing services to the entire rice producing area of Boundo and its surroundings. Once this is achieved, he aims to increase human resource by multiplying the number of its team and eventually maximize profits.

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