The Management
The Sponsor and owner of the farm is Buyuni REDD (Tanzania) Farms Limited, a private limited liability Company owned by Tanzanian entrepreneurs with professional backgrounds in engineering, finance and engineering. For too long, Tanzania professionals have shied away from agriculture, looking down upon it as a menial task or a thankless business fit only for peasants at the lower subsistence end and foreigners at the higher commercial top. We aim to break this myth and show to the middle-class that Tanzania's agribusiness lies far behind its rightful potential specifically because of this neglect by her leading citizens. We hope to play our part in changing this mindset.
The Directors of BRF are:
- Mr. George Fumbuka, a professional accountant with background in accounting and finance, one of the pioneers of the capital markets industry in Tanzania. He is CEO of CORE Securities Limited, licensed dealing members of the Dar es Salaam Stock Exchange.
- Mrs Eva Fumbuka, a professional Engineer with background in the design, operation andmanagement of electric power systems. She worked in TANESCO for over 25 years, leaving with the position of Regional Manager for TANESCO Kinondoni North. She is currently CEO of Pomy Engineering Company Limited, registred electrical, civil and contracting engineers.
- Mr. Jacob "Miku" Fumbuka serves as the Business coordinator, recently graduated with HND in Business Administration and Entreneurship.
- A registered Trust, the Moses Foundation, provides the link between the Company and the local communities as the Company's arm for inclusive business to connect the middle-class to the grassroots. We see this as the only way that Tanzania's enormous potential can be realised, toward bread-basket status for her in the EA Region.
The Company has entered into contracts with the following professionals to realise the Project's activities and benefits:
- Mr. Segunda Lesilwa will be the Master Beekeeper and Farm Manager. He has been in the honeykeeping industry since qualifying from the Olmotonyi Forestry Institute with a Diploma in Beekeeping in 2011. He has been involved in all aspects of the industry: from establishment and general management of apiaries across Tanzania; extension services given to and collection of quality honey from Outgrowers and individual farmers; production of quality money using modern machines ISO-certified; to general management of beekeeping projects. He has also attended professional and vocational programs in computing; HIV/AIDS Care; Records and Office Management; and Food Safety Management Systems (FSMS) under ISO 22000. Before joining Buyuni, he worked for Nyuki Tanzania project (a pan-territorial project operating in Dodoma and Western Tanzania), then for Honey King Limited, a Chinese retail buyer and consolidator of honey for export to international markets.
- Engineer Harold Makundi, a professional agricultural Engineer will be Project Manager, responsible for setting up and coordinating the activities of the entire project. He will be reporting to a Board of Directors and evaluated on the basis of the approved business plan and budgets form time to time. He qualified with a BSc in Agricultural Engineering at UDSM/SUA 1984-1987 and has since then worked in all professional aspects (maintenance; research; extension services) in SUDECO and the sugar industry in general. He has also managed public projects in tree planting and land management. He has since then specialised in agro-forestry products (seedling, timber, Climate change under the UN REDD+ program) as an Environmental Engineer. He is a director of many entities in commercial agriculture.
- Mr. Dhahiri Liana, a retired Forester and Master Beekeeper who served in the agriculture and beekeeping sector for 38 years, during which he has been served as Regional Agricultural and Livestock Development Officer and Zonal Bee-keeping Coordinator. Generally regarded as a national authority on these matters, Mr. Liana in retirement now owns an NGO called AGROHESO that carries out training programs in the design, construction and management of beekeeping equipment and demonstration farms. Mr. Liana has been contracted as the Consultant for the project.
- Mr. Christopher Mwasambili, a private business management consultant and broker based in London, England, will act as the Overseas Liaison Advisor. A broker facilitates partnerships between civil society, the public and the private sectors. The activities of a broker include convening potential partners, researching context and feasibility, building capacity of participating organizations, acting as a promoter to ensure progress of the overall initiative and monitoring the implementation of new partnerships. He is a noted authority on Inclusive Agribusiness as a member of various international fora dedicated to social development and the alleviation of poverty. He will sit on the Board of Directors as ex-officio whenever he is in Tanzania.
- Professor Willy Makundi will serve as an Independent Director on the Board of Directors of Buyuni REDD Farms Limited, with specific corporate governance responsibilities. Dr. Makundi is a Nobel-prize winning Economist, part of the USA Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that won the 2007 Nobel Prize jointly with former Vice-President Al Gore. Professor Makundi, currently Director of Climate Change Division and Principal Scientist for Environmental Management Consultants Tanzania, will appoint a local communities representative to join him on the Board, through the Buyuni Enterprise & Development Innovation Center. One of BEDIC's initiatives is with broader-based development issues like commercial farming; warehouse receipts; and financial inclusion through microfinance and microinsurance.
