Amazi Foods: Growing and Redefining Agricultural Supply Chains from the Ground Up

It is estimated that every time we sit down for breakfast, lunch, or dinner, the food that we eat will have traveled an estimated 1,500 miles from the farms where the food was originally produced to the plates on our dining room tables. While many environmentally-conscious consumers will be rightfully concerned about the enormous carbon footprint associated with the fossil fuels used to transport food around the world, there are other important issues associated with the globalization of our food supply that needs to be taken into consideration. For example, the ever-increasing distance between producer and consumer means that it is virtually impossible to know the farmer who produced your food, the wages that he or she earned, or the methods used to cultivate the soil. Long ingredient lists alongside complex global supply chains make it increasingly harder for consumers to gather an intimate understanding of the wholesomeness of the food we put into our bodies and the health of the farming communities and local ecosystems where that food was grown.

While it is certainly possible to visit your local farmer´s market to purchase fresh produce or sign up for a local community-supported agriculture (CSA) program to receive a weekly box of farm-fresh meat, eggs, and dairy, most people who prioritize healthy and organic lifestyles will also probably rely on several food products grown around the world. The quinoa in your morning granola might have been grown in the Bolivian Andes, while the Acai berries in your afternoon smoothie might have been picked by indigenous people of the Amazon. For consumers who want to develop a sense of relationship with the food they eat, is it possible to stay ethically connected to the farming communities and ecological growing practices when food is produced on the other side of the planet?

Amazi Foods is one health food brand that goes the extra mile to make sure that health food consumers can trust that their food is ethically and sustainably produced by farming communities in Africa. According to their website: “We aim to go a step beyond ethical sourcing, supporting sustainable supply chains and creating connection all through the production of our good-for-you snacks. How? We commit to keeping the production process in the country from which we source. With every bite of Amäzi you take, you help close the gap between source and consumer, between consumer and source.”

Who is Amazi Foods?

Amazi Foods was founded in April 2016 by Renee Dunn. During college, Renee had studied abroad in Uganda to look at the factors affecting the entrepreneurial sector of the country. She found that despite the fact that Uganda was the 2nd largest producer of organic produce in the world, the vast majority of harvested produce was either locally traded or exported as a raw product. Both of these approaches left minimal profit to farmers and stymied entrepreneurial efforts. Instead of using the abundance of organic produce to create pathways towards dignified employment for rural communities, Dunn found growing levels of unemployment, food waste, and business stagnation.

On the other side of the world, Dunn found that the natural, health food industry in the United States was growing by leaps and bounds. According to one recent report, the health and wellness food market is expected to see a growth rate of 5.7 percent by 2024 and could grow to an incredible market size of USD $1,253 billion. Dunn wondered, how could small farming communities in Africa become meaningfully connected to the growing American interest in healthier, natural foods and snacks?

Following that question, Dunn created Amazi foods and focuses on making healthier, nutritional snacks from plantain and jackfruit that are grown by small Ugandan farmers. “My vision is to transform Uganda’s best tropical fruits into wholesome, clutter-free snacks, ensuring transparency, opportunity, quality, and connection so that you can #SnackonPurpose to fuel your purpose-driven life,” says Dunn.

Moving Beyond Fair Trade

For many health food consumers, the best way to ethically consume the superfoods they depend on in order to achieve their health goals is to prioritize products that have received some sort of “fair trade” certification. Today, there are dozens of certification agencies that evaluate and appraise everything from labor conditions to the sustainability of forest management. Unfortunately, just because a certain product comes with a gigantic “fair trade certified” label does not necessarily mean that the produce was ethically and sustainably produced.

In the coffee industry, numerous examples have surfaced of supposedly fair trade coffee paying small farmers wages that are well below the legal minimum wage of their countries. Furthermore, a report by the Adam Smith Institute concluded that many fair trade certifications amount to little more than a marketing exercise that helps brands stay “competitive” by appealing to the social concerns of their customers. The report goes on to say that many fair trade certifications often leave large segments of the population worse off through only creating relationships with a small member of farming communities.

As more and more consumers begin to demand healthy, nutritious, environmentally responsible, and ethically produced foods, many certification agencies will regrettably be tempted to cut corners in order to increase their market share and appeal to environmentally and socially conscious consumers.

Amazi Foods ‘ Direct Trade Focus

Amazi Foods aims to avoid this pitfall by committing to creating close relationships with the farmers that produce the plantains and jackfruits that are the essential ingredients in the healthy snacks they produce.

Dunn says: “I wanted to figure out how to break the cycle and move the economy away from solely serving as resource providers to offering more value-added services. Though agricultural exports make up about 80% of Uganda’s total exports, raw ingredients are not processed and packaged in Uganda, which means very little profit stays within the country. I thought, perhaps naively at the time, that if we could take the time to train people how to produce marketable products, recipe development, and quality consistency, we could involve them in the process, increase employment and grow the local marketplace.”

Rather than fair trade, Amazi Food engages in what they call “direct trade.” This agreement moves beyond simply paying farmers a higher price for their products. Rather, Amazi Foods says that they “believe in building partnerships that are direct and open with the farmers from which we source. We include them in conversations on pricing, seasonality, partnership arrangements, and more, so that they can make informed, fair decisions while we work together. We aim to cut out any third parties, with our production teams purchasing directly from farming cooperatives or family-owned farms.”

The direct trade initiatives utilized by Amazi Foods also go beyond fair trade approaches because of the focus on negotiated contracts. Instead of simply responding to global commodity prices, direct trade takes into intimate consideration seasonality issues in order to determine a fair price for both farmers and manufacturers of their products. According to Amazi´s website, direct trade is all about “being honest, knowing the farmers at the source, and letting the farmers know us as well.”

Dunn says that “I am learning it’s not as romantic as simply paying higher wages, there also needs to be transparency around margins and explaining constraints in our cash flow.  As a small business owner, I have to play the agility game while also never compromising.”

Furthermore, Amazi Foods is one of the few health food brands that manufacturers its products in the country of origin. Instead of simply purchasing raw materials for export, the commitment to in-country manufacturing allows for greater employment and entrepreneurial opportunities that allow more of the profit to stay within Uganda. Lastly, Amazi also contributes a type of development fund to farming communities. For every kilogram of jackfruit or plantain that they purchase, the company sets aside $0.25 for that development fund. During the past years of operation, these funds have been used to support development initiatives that are instigated by the farmer groups they work with, including the purchase of school supplies for local youth, the construction of community centers, and the growing cooperative farming businesses.

The Economic Possibilities of Sustainable and Ethical Sourcing

Today, Amazi Foods is sold across the United States, most notably at Sprouts Farmers Markets, Albertson´s grocery store, on Amazon, and through their own website. In the four years since its founding, Amazi Foods has successfully found coast-to-coast retail locations for their products.

Dunn admits that “I believe there has to be a differentiating factor to get the customer to pay a higher price. Our mission is to provide more opportunities for innovation in Uganda and we hope our customers buy our products because they taste good but also because they can trust that we are giving back to the community.  There is so much marketing around fair trade and sustainability that it has become hard to know which brands are really engaging with the local community so we do our best to be transparent and show our customers how their purchase is making an impact.”

Recent polls have found that a large segment of consumers are willing to pay between 50 and 100 percent for sustainably and ethically produced products. Amazi´s efforts to create meaningful connections between their customers in the United States and small farmers in Uganda is an inspiring example of how our globalized food system can still offer fair, ethical treatment to the often-invisible farmers and laborers who work to put food on our tables.

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