On November 2nd and 3rd, 2022, the AfriConEU International Brokerage Event was held in Bologna, Italy, with parallel events taking place around the world. The parallel event in Tanzania was held at the Buni Innovation Hub. Several participants attended the event to expand its network, create synergies, and bring closer African and European DIHs.

Participants attended the panels taking place in Bologna and also attended speakers physically in Tanzania. 

Rose Funja talked about how farmers can get solutions to precious agriculture, which result in increased crop yields, reduced farming costs and sustainable agriculture. Agrinfo uses drones to get precise data by scanning farms using an agriculture sensor. The drones can view both the visible and invisible spectrum since the visible spectrum is the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum visible to the human eye. Plan, analyze and act upon the data collected by the drone. According to the data collected, it can detect how your crops/plants are growing, which are healthy, unhealthy, diseased or dead.

Jumanne Mtambalike is an innovator, technology enthusiast, and Programme Development and Project Management Expert. He talked about the growth in Access to technologies, how the digital economy is affecting the country and Africa in general, and mobile penetration- which highly drives the economy, money transactions, technology enthusiasts and transformation in Africa/internationally. There is a need to create businesses that can bring opportunities, impact, change and sustainability. Essentially, we must be honest with each other in building startups/businesses.

To finalize the event on day two, we had 4 World cafe tables where participants freely discussed. ​​The goal was to create a setting akin to a cafe, where attendees mingle and join conversations in a relaxed atmosphere. Key elements include giving all participants space to speak, connecting ideas from different actors, and providing mutually relevant topics for discussion world cafe participants had 4 half-hour rounds rotating among different tables, each with a different prompt or theme. Facilitators at each table guided conversations among participants that explored potential collaborations, major themes and topics, and specific challenges related to the main themes for AfriConEU.

In conclusion, the two-day event significantly increased the participants’ knowledge levels. It exposed them to possible markets they could take advantage of to build their start-up businesses from national to international.

You can find more info about the event: