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Co-founder · Novi Sad
Founder name TBC
Strategy, fundraising, and Novi Sad operations.
Manna is a young foundation with a clear mission: deliver the proven four-service bundle for smallholder farmers — seed, training, finance, market access — to one region of one country at a time, done properly, measured honestly.
Manna is the old name for sustenance that arrives in a hard place at the moment it is needed — enough to carry people through, given when there was no other way.
We borrow the idea, not the literal sense. We don’t hand out food. We deliver the few things a farming family needs in the season they need them — seed, training, finance, a route to market — so the next harvest, and every one after, is their own. We don’t belabour it. The point is the timing.
— Provision · Timing · Independence
Our most important partner is academic. A young foundation can be earnest about method without being rigorous about it; a research faculty cannot. This partnership is what allows Manna’s pilot to be measured, not estimated.
Memorandum of Understanding · signed 2026 · Novi Sad
MoU signed in 2026 covering the cooperative-led recruitment of the first cohort.
Letters of intent in place; cohort recruitment opens January 2026.
Baseline survey and GPS parcel mapping with KoBoToolbox, cooperative briefings, and a forward offtake contract. 200 farmers enrolled; control group selected.
Input procurement and depot delivery — bulk purchase from a certified distributor in Moshi — group formation in groups of 15–20, and field-officer training.
Planting with field-officer visits on sowing, spacing, and top-dressing, plus fall-armyworm monitoring. Demo plot active; video and drone documentation begins.
Crop monitoring, fall-armyworm treatment if needed, and storage preparation. Crop-cut sampling begins; UNS audit coordination underway.
Harvest, yield measurement, aggregated sale, and repayment day. Repayment rate published immediately; revolving fund replenished.
Endline survey, UNS independent audit, and the year-one report published. All six metrics public; raw data available to donors on request.
Manna is being built by a small founding team across Novi Sad and Dar es Salaam, supported by academic advisors from the Faculty of Agriculture. Final names and bios will be published as roles are confirmed.
Strategy, fundraising, and Novi Sad operations.
In-country operations, cooperative relations, government affairs.
Faculty of Agriculture. Heads measurement, agronomy advisory, and the year-one audit.
Tanzania-based; supervises the field-officer cohort and depot operations.
Board composition will be finalised and published with names in Q1 2026.
The audit, the measurement, and the field-officer salaries are funded by donors. Repayments will recycle into year two. Year one is the one that needs you.