Jetlak Foods

Jetlak Foods is a private limited manufacturing company that specializes in the manufacturing of branded peanut butter, fruit juices, fruit-flavored drinks, and bottling of drinking water for mass-market consumers in Kenya and the East African Region and particularly the middle-income segment.

The project

Jetlak is sourcing groundnuts directly from smallholder farmers by establishing a reliable supply base to ensure quality and traceability of the produce. Previously, the company sourced produce through contracted traders who sourced groundnuts from Western and Eastern Kenya as well as imports from Zambia and Malawi, an arrangement that had been fraught with food safety issues due to high aflatoxin levels.

Project activities

• Developing a sustainable smallholder-based groundnut seed system through sourcing of breeder seeds from ICRISAT and University of Egerton.
• Sensitizing, mobilizing, and aggregating farmers into producer groups, facilitating soil testing, setting up of demonstration plots and training in good agronomic practices to increase productivity. 
• Capacity building in post-harvest management and food safety which is addressing the aflatoxin menace that is a real challenge in groundnut farming.
• Positioning of the Nuteez Peanut Butter brand as a quality conscious and more superior brand.
• Developing and rolling out a digital-based database-ICT and digital platforms including mobile telephony to enhance access to information for farmers as well as traceability of produce for Jetlak.
• The project management component will entail monitoring and evaluation, data collection, report writing, strategic engagements with policymakers at the county level, project coordination, and implementation.