Meet a young agripreneur who ventured into French bean production

Cyuzuzo Anitha is a young agripreneur ventured into French beans production, Anitha started her business in 2021, with starting capital of RWF 500,000. Her business is located in Bugesera District, Rilima sector, Kimaranzara Cell. CYUZUZO has a bachelor's degree in banking and finance obtained from Mount Kenya University, and venturing into French beans has been her passion.

Before starting French beans production, Anitha approached farmers to deeply understand requirements and challenges in the value chain, in their discussion, the minimum starting capital was estimated to RWF 1.5Millions which she only had a third of it at that time.

“I started with a very small area (approximately ½ ha), I never did market assessment and analysis to know the demand of my products. Thus, I had no contacts with buyers. However, after realizing that the market is a challenge, I have taken my time to look for markets and luckily got a contract with the company that exports French beans. Due to the profit that I get from French beans production, I am currently capable of investing in 1 to 2 million Rwandan francs as starting capital for a new business” says CYUZUZO Anitha.

Anitha faces different challenges as well as her fellow youth in agribusiness and these challenges include access to productive assets (land, information, inputs mainly quality seeds and water for production).

Despite the above-mentioned challenges, Anitha has now cultivated on an area over one hectare (1ha) and expects to harvest over four million (4M) Rwandan francs.