Ubuntu Capital backs Agrofresh Ug platform to connect Ugandan exporters with global buyers
The UK-based investment firm’s partnership with the Agrofresh UG platform puts traceability, certification and value addition at the centre of a new export model for Ugandan farmers and SMEs.
KAMPALA, August 24, 2026 — UK-based investment firm Ubuntu Capital has reaffirmed its support for Agrofresh Ug, a digital platform designed to help Ugandan farmers, cooperatives and exporters meet international traceability and compliance requirements and contract directly with foreign buyers.
The commitment was highlighted last week during a Kampala workshop on traceability and compliance, which brought together farmers, cooperatives and exporters from the coffee, cocoa, fresh fruit, sesame and vanilla sectors.
The workshop focused on growing requirements for access to premium international markets, including the European Union Deforestation Regulation [EUDR], organic certification and ethical sourcing standards.
Agrofresh Ug, in which Ubuntu Capital has invested, provides a digital system that links farmers, plots, purchases, batches, lots, consignments and shipments in a continuous traceability chain.
The platform also provides exporters with digital contracts, warehouse receipts, access to finance based on trading records and information on verified international demand.
Samuel Kitone, founder of Ubuntu Capital, said the lack of traceability and certification had limited the presence of Ugandan agricultural products in international markets despite the quality and potential of local produce.
“For years it has troubled me that Ugandan produce is so rarely found on European supermarket shelves. The barrier was never the quality of what our farmers grow; it was traceability and certification: the ability to prove a crop’s origin and to meet standards such as GlobalG.A.P.,” Kitone said.
He said Uganda had significant potential in agricultural products including medicinal plants, fruits and botanical products, but lacked the infrastructure needed to finance, process and export them at scale.
“Through Ubuntu Capital’s investment in and partnership with Agrofresh Ug, we are building the infrastructure to turn that potential into sustainable, predictable and high-value export earnings for farmers, and to empower Ugandan SMEs to hold contracts directly with international buyers, from processors and importers to medical manufacturers,” he said.
The partners said the platform is intended to help shift Uganda’s agricultural exports away from reliance on raw commodities sold on spot markets towards higher-value products, including fruit purées and concentrates, botanical extracts and medicinal plants such as aloe vera.
Ubuntu Capital and Agrofresh Ug said they were prioritising international buyer demand and verified contracts before asking farmers to supply products, with the aim of giving producers greater certainty over markets.
Laban Musinguzi, founder of Agrofresh Ug, said integrating compliance into routine agricultural and export processes could reduce the burden on exporters seeking to meet international standards.
“Ubuntu Capital’s partnership has let us build the platform Ugandan exporters actually need. When the compliance record is created while the work is done, meeting a buyer’s standards stops being a scramble at the end of the season and becomes a by-product of doing business well,” Musinguzi said.
The companies said traceable farmer and plot records would enable Ugandan small and medium-sized enterprises to pursue direct contracts with international processors, importers and manufacturers.
Ubuntu Capital said it plans to support further training sessions for farmers and exporters and continue investing in infrastructure intended to connect Ugandan producers with premium international markets.
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