Diana Orembe
Interview with Diana Orembe
CO-FOUNDER AND CEO, NOVFEED
Lives in: Tanzania
This 12 months, Tanzanian entrepreneur Diana Orembe expects her enterprise, NovFeed, to generate effectively over $1 million in gross sales. The corporate produces fish feed and natural fertiliser. In December, Orembe took residence first prize within the Africa’s Enterprise Heroes entrepreneurship competitors. How we made it in Africa’s editor-in-chief Jaco Maritz spoke to her about how she constructed the enterprise.
Subjects mentioned in the course of the interview embody:
Accepting that every one companies are exhausting
Learn how to promote to small-scale farmers
Recognizing a enterprise alternative in fish feed
Getting the enterprise off the bottom
The toughest half: promoting
Watch the total interview beneath:
** Our new e-book, How we made it in Africa II: Actual tales of entrepreneurs turning alternative into revenue, is obtainable right here. **
Interview abstract
For Diana Orembe, co-founder and chief govt of NovFeed – a Tanzanian fish feed and natural fertiliser firm – one of many core classes of entrepreneurship is that every one companies are exhausting.
“In case you speak to a girl promoting greens on the markets, she’s going to let you know how exhausting it’s to run her enterprise. In case you speak to an individual working a conglomerate, he’ll simply say the identical [about] how tough it’s to run that very enormous, large enterprise. In case you speak to a medium-scale enterprise one who is even working only a retailer, they are going to inform you a similar [about] the way it’s tough. So what I used to be simply reminding myself this morning is that every one companies are tough,” she explains.
As a substitute of trying to find a better path, Orembe retains in thoughts that the grass isn’t greener elsewhere – each kind of enterprise comes with its personal set of issues.
The origins of NovFeed
Orembe grew up near Lake Victoria – Africa’s largest freshwater lake. “We used to scrub our garments [and] fetch water instantly from the lake,” she remembers.
It was there she watched her uncle run a small-scale fish farm, ceaselessly complaining concerning the excessive price and normal shortage of fish feed.
Whereas finding out microbiology on the College of Dar es Salaam, Orembe researched the aquaculture sector in Tanzania. She realised that the issues her uncle had complained about have been nonetheless prevalent throughout the trade. The nation was closely depending on imported fish feed, which saved costs excessive.
Decided to create an reasonably priced native different, she relied on the College of Dar es Salaam’s laboratory to conduct her preliminary analysis and develop a minimal viable product. She formally launched NovFeed in 2020.
The enterprise converts meals waste collected from native markets into fish feed by means of a pure fermentation course of. This course of additionally yields a microbial liquid byproduct that NovFeed sells as fertiliser. In its early days, the corporate operated out of a small manufacturing unit with a most capability of 30 tonnes of feed per 30 days.
Gross sales and distribution
When it got here to gross sales, Orembe’s crew saved their messaging easy. They averted specializing in the precise manufacturing course of or utilizing phrases like ‘sustainability. “I’ve discovered alongside the journey that the message you’re giving your prospects actually issues. Whenever you inform an individual that that is bacteria-made fish feed, everybody will run away.”
As a substitute, the crew centered on the advantages, telling potential purchasers they’d discovered a greater approach to produce fish feed at a way more reasonably priced worth. The feed sells for $1.30 per kg with a 30% revenue margin, and the fertiliser for $3 per litre with a 35% margin.
The corporate additionally gives after-sales help to farmers, advising them on normal fish farming finest practices.
NovFeed’s merchandise are offered by means of agricultural outlets in Tanzania. To get farmers and agro shops within the merchandise, the corporate arrange demonstration farms to indicate them in motion. Orembe notes that agro shops usually solely need to inventory merchandise that farmers already know, relatively than danger shelf house on one thing unfamiliar that can simply sit there.
Orembe says it wasn’t till 2024 that she felt she actually had a strong enterprise. For her, that validation got here when prospects began putting repeat orders. “It doesn’t matter how good your product is, when you can’t retain the shoppers, it’ll at all times be one of many alerts that your product will not be working,” she explains. “So for us, the second we began seeing the shopper is shopping for and is coming again, that was a very good signal.”
Growing manufacturing
In December, the corporate received $300,000 within the Africa’s Enterprise Heroes competitors. The funding was allotted to rising the corporate’s manufacturing capability. Now, with its new manufacturing unit, NovFeed can produce greater than 20 tonnes of fish feed per day.
Orembe can be taking a look at opening the corporate’s personal community of shops.
In 2024, the enterprise generated $420,000 in income. Orembe notes that in 2025, gross sales doubled. With the brand new facility operational, she expects income to extend by much more than that in 2026.
‘It’s a must to promote’
Regardless of the latest income development and the brand new manufacturing unit, Orembe factors out that the challenges by no means cease. She cites recruitment – buying the precise expertise and managing them – as one of many hardest elements of her job.
However her greatest instant concern is promoting the sheer quantity of product the corporate is now able to making.
“I’ve by no means been in a position to produce 20 tonnes of feed per day … Now the place am I going to search for a buyer who can entry that per day?” she wonders, including that she worries about whether or not older leads have already discovered different suppliers. “All these items have been working into my thoughts.”
“Having the ability to produce [is] only one factor,” she provides. “However on the finish of the day, it’s important to promote. That’s essentially the most, most tough half.”
