Joyce Kimaro’s Journey To Making “Ufukwe” a Household Brand in Tanzania

Safe Food Systems

By Kilimokwanza.org reporter

 “I am a very ordinary Tanzanian!”

That is how Ms Joyce Donati Kimaro, co-founder and Managing Director of Joydons (T) Limited, describes herself, looking up in the blue azure skies of Bagamoyo, the historic seaport of eastern Tanzania. But for those who have seen her actualizing her dream, she is an extraordinary entrepreneur. 

Bagamoyo,  is where Joyce and her elder sister Joyce (they like to call themselves Joyce and Joyce or Kimaro sisters) have set up a state-of-the-art cereal milling factory with the capacity to produce aflatoxin-free flours.

“Bagamoyo” means “lay down your heart” in Swahili. It is the place on the 18th Century slave trade route where slaves “left” behind their “hearts” or “spirits” before being forcefully shipped to faraway foreign lands.

Joyce Donati says she has laid down her heart at Bagamoyo to influence the eating habits of over 50 million Tanzanians.  The youthful industrialist has managed to push up Joydons to be among the top ten grain millers in Tanzania.

Pursuing a deep-belly passion, a dream and a vision with determination to change the world in her ‘little way, even if she has to surmount a million challenges, she admits it is a very long shot.

“I belong to the world of possibilities, where the future is even brighter,” she says. Her worldview explains the remarkable transformation she has undergone over time.

Starting her work life as a primary school teacher, she quickly discovered that the teacher’s success is always about the pupils and not about self. This philosophy continues to influence her in placing “humanity at the heart of my entrepreneurship.”

“My mission is to ensure the population consumes healthy maize meal (ugali in Swahili), free from aflatoxins and any other harmful agents,” she says.  Capturing a significant market segment is not an easy task, but her determination is excellent. “We have made some remarkable strides,” she says.

Her company’s flagship products – Unga wa SEMBE(polished maize flour), Unga wa DONA(whole grain maize flour), and Unga MUHOGO (Cassava flour) – are rapidly gaining traction in the Tanzanian market. Distributed under the brand, ” UFUKWE,” the products are packaged in 5-, 10- and 25-kilogram bags for wholesale and retail outlets.

Retailers usually repackage the precious commodity to sell to consumers in ¼ kg, ½ kg, 1kg or 2kg measures. Concerned that flours may be contaminated with toxins in the repackaging process, Joydons aims to popularise the smaller 1kg and 2kg packages, which have started taking the small shops by storm, something new in the Tanzania grain market.

From makeshift “mabati” mill to an industrial dream coming true

The story of Joydons began as a dream in 2012 with a micro-scale mill in Dar es Salaam, which grew over time into a small scale milling plant. In 2017, the operations expanded to Bagamoyo by setting up a small plant in a make-shift building with a milling capacity of 10 MT per day. Hardly four years later, the dynamic duo has beaten many odds to grow their operating capital base from US$2,156 to US$1.3 million. The new plant employs 250 workers directly and indirectly and supports over 3,500 smallholder farmers in Tanzania.

Joyce sees the factory significantly transforming the industrial skyline of Bagamoyo. “We are making Bagamoyo a centre of grains trade and branded flours, a land of hope, dreams and optimism. Bagamoyo is becoming a part of “glorious Tanzania in the making.”

Growing domestic demand for maize flour fuels her ambition to vie for a sizable share of the domestic market and, ultimately, the African export market.

Joyce attributes their ongoing exploits to the support from development partners, including Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) (through the AGRA YieldWise project) and Tanzania Agricultural Development Bank (TADB).

Financing by the two partners to the tune of TZS 1.3 billion (about USD564, 726) enabled the company to procure their state-of-the-art plant, whose features include 90 – 120 MT per day maize milling capacity, grain sorting machine, colour sorting machine, a packing machine and a weighbridge scale. The financing kit also enabled the construction of two (2) foundation bottom silos with 1,000 MTs storage capacity.

The COVID-19 pandemic affected Joydons as it has many other businesses globally; by delaying the shipment of equipment needed to complete the plant, resulting in cost overrun and underproduction. It made the firm need an additional US$53,000 financing to resolve the challenge. 

The youthful industrialist is also a proprietor of a microfinance firm and an insurance brokerage company. Joyce shares some nuggets of counsel for success in her inspiring autobiography, “I Had to Lose My Virginity: How I Used My Inner Self to Achieve Success.”

What others say about Joydons:  H.E. Desalegn, H.E. Dr Kikwete, Dr Michael, Mr. Rweyendela

When the retired  President of the United Republic of Tanzania and Board Member of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA),  H.E. Dr Jakaya Kikwete, visited the factory, he described Jordon as an extraordinary enterprise.

He noted that entrepreneurs like the Kimaro sisters “represent the future of homemade agro-industrial drive in Tanzania.”

H.E. Dr Kikwete had accompanied H.E. Hailemariam Desalegn, the AGRA Board Chair and former Ethiopian Prime Minister, to visit.