farip supports innovation in rural areas in Africa and targeted attempts to improve the income of farming families with new business ideas. Small farmers are increasingly focusing their business ideas on fair trade and their own transport chain – without intermediaries – from the collection points in the highlands to the points of sale, and on direct marketing in the city. farip plays the role of both a microcredit bank and a coach and advisor to help these proactive people move forward. This gives them the chance to show in an experimental phase that their ideas can work.
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farip supports farming families in their experiments and efforts to improve the production and marketing of agricultural products and increase their income, thereby promoting rural village development.
farip is funded by donations and contributions.Thank you for standing with smallholder farmers!
10 Years of farip – From “Farmer Spy” to Friend – A journey through time with Ueli Scheuermeier and Bahat Tweve
2026-07-02. It was probably around 25 years ago when I first met Bahat Tweve, tells farip’s CEO Ueli Scheuermeier. We met in the office of Mama Nyanzali, who led the district’s agricultural advisory service. At the time, I was working in the southern highlands of Tanzania as a consultant for the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).
Mama Nyanzali introduced Bahat with a smile as the Mkulima Shushushu – the «farmer spy». A farmer spy? Yes. Bahat was both an excellent farmer and an experienced trader. He travelled to town markets to find out what prices farmers could really achieve for their maize if they negotiated hard enough. He knew the markets from the inside and understood the long and complex journey from the field to people’s plates.
Before long, we were exchanging ideas with farmers and traders in Kenya and Uganda. We learned a great deal together. Very quickly, one topic became central to every discussion: marketing. «We know how to produce,» the farmers said. «But why should we grow more if we receive almost nothing for the surplus?»
Bahat was always the practical thinker. Again and again, he reminded us that one day things had to work without projects run by development organisations. So I was not surprised when, years later, he took me aside and said: «We want to stop working with projects. We don’t want to receive handouts anymore.» I asked him what they wanted instead. «We are farmers and traders. We are business people. We want to make our own decisions. We don’t want aid – we want partnership.» Then he made it personal: «I want to see your coin in my success, and your loss in my loss when things go wrong. Otherwise, I am not interested in continuing to work with you.»
Those conversations led to the creation of farip ten years ago.
The First Training Courses for Forest Wardens “Watunza Misitu”
The tree-secured credit system TCRD can soon be used in the whole region around Magunguli. “We urgently need to train more Watunza, so that families in nearby villages can also join,” says Ragpa Tweve, the first forest warden “Mtunza Misitu” in Magunguli. Forest wardens take care of registering and checking the farmers’ tree plots. farip is now supporting the first forest warden training with start-up funding of CHF 12,000. With your donation, you help fund the first training courses. These include growing native plants, registering tree plots for credit security, bookkeeping, and more. We thank you very much on behalf of Ragpa and his team for your financial support!
Read more about “Watunza Misitu”..
HOW DOES SCOUTING WORK
How does an interesting idea in rural Africa turn into a successful small business? It takes scouting! farip specializes in exactly that: We assist enterprising villagers in rural Tanzania to develop the business ideas they present to us. farip digs deeper and asks: Who are the people who want to take this on, and how do they organize themselves? What practical tests could show whether the idea is viable? And where is the market for the products? Many ideas have to be discarded; only the best ones make it to be supported by farip as a venture. Scouting comes into play again when failures occur: Learning and sharing experiences is the key to development.
MAP OF FARIP’S ACTIVITIES
farip operates in the southern highlands of Tanzania around Makambako and Magunguli and along the transport route to Dar es Salaam, in Msowero and Morogoro. In the city, the «Vijikweli» products (which means “truly from the village”) are marketed.
Over the past ten years of collaboration, farip has learned that village development is only possible if agricultural production loans are fundamentally reorganized without existential risks: The concept of tree-secured loans (TCRD) is the innovative solution devised by the people of Magunguli. The TCRD-efforts have been underway for three years.
Updated: 2026-07-15