First step in growing partners in the agricultural industry across Africa Daedong donates agricultural machinery to help develop the agricultural industry in Cape Verde
First step in growing partners in the agricultural industry across Africa Daedong donates agricultural machinery to help develop the agricultural industry in Cape Verde
- Last September, officials from Daedong visited Cape Verde, which imports 90% of its food, and signed an agreement with the local government to supply agricultural machinery for free
- Daedong delivers agricultural machinery (tractors, cultivators, etc.) worth approximately KRW 200 million, teaches farmers how to use/repair machines, and offers access to its agricultural solutions
- Company supplies agricultural machinery and agricultural solutions in Africa to prove its capacity as a partner for agricultural industries supported by the government
Daedong Group's future agtech platform company Daedong (Co-CEO: Kim Jun-Sik and Won Yu-Hyun) announced on March 18 that it had recently donated agricultural machinery worth KRW 200 million, including tractors and cultivators, to help build the agricultural industry infrastructure in Cape Verde, Africa.
Cape Verde is an island country off the coast of northern Africa (North Atlantic Ocean) with a population of 580,000. Stretching across just 400,000 hectares, which is twice that of Jeju-do Island, only 9.2% of the arable land in Cape Verde has access to irrigation and agricultural water. Unsurprisingly, it imports 90% of its food, and agriculture accounts for only 9% of Cape Verde’s total GDP.
In September of last year, officials from Daedong traveled to Cape Verde as part of an economic convoy led by the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy of Korea to seek local partners that could help develop the agricultural industry in African countries, most of which have a difficult time being self-sufficient when it comes to supplying food. On its visit to Cape Verde, the company agreed on the “free supply of agricultural machinery” with the local Ministry of Agriculture and Environment. As part of the agreement, Daedong will donate KRW 200 million worth of agricultural machinery, including 90-horsepower tractors, cultivators, and plow/rotary attachments.
By donating agricultural machinery and teaching locals how to use and repair machines, Daedong is hoping to improve the infrastructure for agriculture and boost the overall productivity of Cape Verde’s agricultural industry. In collaboration with Cape Verde's Ministry of Agriculture, Daedong will carry out a pilot cultivation project in each region to teach how to use machines and provide a technical education program to train young locals as skilled engineers in terms of using various agricultural machinery.
In the mid to long term, the company is looking to collect local agricultural data and present agricultural solutions tailored to the local agricultural industry. With the Korean government aggressively pushing for what it calls the “K-Rice Belt” project targeting ten African countries, Daedong believes that its strategic decision to support Cape Verde could be the first step in targeting the African market in the future, and open the door for other agricultural solution companies from Korea to enter the African market.
Meanwhile, Daedong has been exporting products in earnest under its own global agricultural machinery brand “KIOTI” since the 1980s, now selling products to 70 countries around the world and earning roughly 70% of its total sales revenue overseas. The company has been working in multiple countries for several years, which helped it build up the experience and capacity to promote the mechanization of agriculture most notably in Myanmar and Angola where Daedong each supplied USD 100 million worth of agricultural machinery in 2014 and 2018, respectively. Today, the company is pushing for the “digitalization of agriculture” in Korea by promoting future businesses such as smart agricultural machinery and smart farms powered by AI, data, and robot technology.