Safi: Ensuring Milk Safety for Farmers in East Africa

Milk is a basic product for the livelihood of thousands of small farmers and inhabitants of East Africa, where around 90% of the produced milk is sold through the informal market. While this provides livelihoods, food security, and income to vulnerable populations, it also poses significant health challenges due to the lack of pasteurization methods available for small producers. This is precisely the gap that Safi fills, an alumni startup from our program Validate.Global. 

Created with the mission to improve milk safety for farmers in East Africa and beyond, Safi was founded by a passionate team of former university students. Since its creation in 2021, the company has already distributed 25 monitoring devices, engaged with 550 farmers, and delivered 7,500 liters of safe, pasteurized milk, which was sold to 1,700 families in Kenya. 

Despite being at the beginning of their journey, Safi has already created a significant impact as unpasteurized milk can be infected with Brucella bacteria, which causes brucellosis, a fever disease spread by contaminated milk. In fact, a scientific paper published by African Crop Science Journal, found that 22.7% of a screened sample from 2,300 animals and 1,140 people in selected areas of Kenya and Tanzania had this disease. And unpasteurized milk has being identified as the cause. 

Safi was founded by Miraal Kabir, Daria Margarit, and Martin Turuta, who were university students when they first developed the idea, when they realized they wanted to focus their talents on something more meaningful—solving a global challenge. After coming across a United Nations challenge on climate change and its impacts on developing countries, the team decided to investigate unsafe milk in East Africa. The region was already facing challenges from climate change, particularly the death of livestock. Farmers were turning to camels as an alternative to cows, but these animals carried diseases that could spread through milk. 

Having grown up in Oman, Miraal Kabir, one of the founders had experienced firsthand the dangers of raw milk when the MERS coronavirus outbreak occurred, transmitted through contaminated milk. With this personal connection to the problem, the team quickly focused on finding a solution to safely pasteurize milk without electricity, especially in off-grid areas. Their innovation was a device that would help farmers pasteurize milk, thus eliminating harmful bacteria and reducing the risk of deadly diseases. The team initially proposed a device that would heat milk without relying on the electrical grid, a unique and seemingly impossible challenge. 

However, after traveling to Rwanda with the support of Validate.Global, the team pivoted their device. Since local farmers shared their feedback on their device, and shared what they really need from Safi. This led the team to pivot their idea, creating a pasteurization control unit instead—one that wouldn’t heat the milk but would monitor the temperature and time to ensure the milk was safely pasteurized. In addition to temperature and time control, Safi includes IoT functionality, enabling data to be sent to regulators and governments for real-time monitoring of the supply chain.

A significant change for farmers

Since then, Safi has made significant strides. The company has distributed 25 devices and has engaged in educational workshops with 550 farmers. The team is now preparing to deliver 1,000 devices through a partnership with the Acumen Fund, a move that will expand their reach and impact. By making milk safer and improving its quality, the device not only helps farmers earn more by selling pasteurized milk at a higher premium but also enables them to diversify their income streams.

Scaling Up: the next milestones

As Safi prepares to scale, the challenge now is manufacturing. Currently, the electronics for the device are sourced from China, but the hardware is produced and assembled in Kenya. This local assembly supports the local economy and reduces logistical challenges. The next major hurdle will be scaling up manufacturing to meet the growing demand.

By 2025, Safi aims to distribute thousands of devices across Rwanda and Kenya, partnering with NGOs and government programs to reach farmers most impacted by climate change.

The Power of Social Entrepreneurship

Safi’s journey exemplifies the power of social entrepreneurship: it is about balancing profit and social impact. In a world where businesses often prioritize financial returns, Safi’s founders have stayed true to their commitment to helping farmers who are struggling with the effects of climate change. They are creating a business model that not only serves the needs of farmers but also empowers them to break free from economic struggles.

While scaling, the team faces the typical challenges of any startup—limited funding, the need for a sustainable business model, and navigating a complex supply chain. However, their experience with Validate Global, their partnership with local governments, and the demand for their product are all signs of a promising future.