The samaki cookie revolution: Tackling malnutrition with value-added business

What started with Francis Thoya baking about a kilogramme of fish-based snacks in a small kitchen has grown into an emerging agribusiness that links farmers to value addition while targeting nutrition challenges in Kenya’s coastal region.

Through his company, EcoAfia Initiative, Mr Thoya processes locally available fish, cassava, moringa, groundnuts, cashew nuts, coconut and baobab into fortified food products. The enterprise currently operates in Kilifi County, where it works with about 500 farmers organised in 10 groups, mainly women, who produce some of the raw materials used in its products.