by Fonban Emmanuel
Image: Selected personnel receiving training for the pilot project
CamCCUL has organized a three-day training workshop at the Women’s Empowerment Center in Mbouda, West Region of Cameroon, to train selected Credit Union personnel on how to utilize the CamCCUL Digital Agric Business Platform. The platform is sponsored through the Integrated Program for the Valorization and Processing of Agricultural and Agri-Food Products, known by its French acronym TRANSFAGRI.
Attending the opening ceremony on Thursday, April 24, 2025, were the Assistant General Manager of CamCCUL- Awa Richard Ndoh, several officials of the establishment, and representatives of three credit unions selected for the pilot project.
The funding, obtained from the French Development Agency through the Debt Reduction and Development Contract (C2D) mechanism amounting to 99.9 million FCFA has been split, with CamCCUL contributing 20% and TRANSFAGRI 80%. This support has led to the development of a software solution designed to help cooperative farmers reach wider markets and gain easier access to collateral-free loans.
“Today is the first seminar that is taking place for the management of credit unions like managers, loan officers and also the customer service officers in the credit unions that will pilot this first phase. It is from this first phase that we can duplicate this in other credit unions,” said the Assistant General Manager of CamCCUL, Awah Richard Ndoh.
The project provides a digital platform to help local farmers sell their produce to a broader market. It is also expected to interconnect farmers with other actors in the agribusiness value chain, enable access to loans without collateral, and offer information about best agricultural practices in the sector.
AFON Ferdinand, the Project Coordinator, explained the inspiration behind the project:
“This project was developed to solve a problem noticed from our research. We noticed so many farmers from our network had to take loans, produce, and the buyam-sellams come and take their produce, sell and sold for their own kind of risk, and the farmers were deprived of enjoying from the original market prices,” he said, adding that the CAGRIB digital platform, as it is called, will allow farmers to connect directly with buyers, eliminating middlemen.
In light of the rise in online scams involving fake products, the founder and CEO of LENJVALS Technologies, CamCCUL’s digital consultant on the project and developer of the platform assured that safeguards have been put in place to ensure only genuine agro-products are sold on the platform.
Founder of LENJVALS Technologies sitting LENJO Valery LENJO and by him project coordinator, AFON Ferdinand during the seminar in Mbouda
“We decentralized the platform in such a way that there is a central administrator that is an employee of the CamCCUL network or their I.T staff that will act as a central or a super administrator. There are many other sub-administrators at the level of the credit union branches who are also I.T personnel that will be able to link directly with the cooperatives under their credit unions. So for the products to find themselves on the platform, the sub-administrators will go directly to the farmer when the products are ready, capture samples of the products at different levels, and then upload them on the platform,” said LENJO Valery LENJO, platform developer and CEO of LENJVALS Technologies.
As the pilot phase of the project is set to roll out, farmers transitioning to digital marketing using this platform are expected to boost their incomes and gain easier access to financial opportunities and broader markets.