How an Agribusiness Consultant Built a 100-Hectare Farm Business in Three Years

Farming on behalf of someone is as old as farming itself. Even the first human was entrusted with the Garden of Eden to cultivate the plants and care for the animals therein, at least according to the Bible. 

Thousands of years later, as humanity developed and moved beyond Eden, this form of business has evolved. Farmers are handing over farms to their trusted and capable relatives and associates, and in more modern form, diasporans and busy urban dwellers buy land for farming and give it to someone to help them manage.

However, over the years, the success of this venture has always hinged on trust and competency. When either of the two is lost, the transaction often fails, just like Adam eating the forbidden fruit led to his dismissal from the garden and humanity's displacement from blissful Eden.

In Nigeria today, finding someone with both the trust and the competence to run a farm on someone else's behalf is often hard, and errors are very costly.

This modern version of an ancient problem is what Ayomide Adefuwa is out to solve with trusted skills, a transparent methodology, and technology.

A graduate of Agricultural Extension from the University of Ilorin (UNILORIN), Adefuwa is the founder and project director, agribusiness strategist and lead operations coordinator at Malum Agro Services. His foray into farm management stemmed from boredom. As an idle undergraduate student during a strike, he was cultivating a two-hectare plot of farmland on the university premises.  

As fate would have it, his conversation with a cab driver, where his competency in the business shone, got him a visit to a larger, 10-hectare farm and an eventual contract for him to start managing it. 

That small, accidental exchange planted the seed of Malum Agro Services, a contract farming and agricultural consulting firm that today manages more than 100 hectares of farmland across Nigeria.

Cultivating Competency from Scratch

The real turning point came during an Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) strike, when school closures got him to think about life after graduation. He began researching the business side of farming and credits two mentors, Dr Kareem and Dr Dauda, for putting him on the right track. 

When the cab driver mentioned earlier showed him that ten-hectare plot, Adefuwa's level advisor gave him advice that has stuck with him since: treat farming like a business, not like a degree. 

The agribusiness’ growth over the past four years reflects a deliberate and consistent expansion strategy. By 2023, one year into the business, the operation had expanded to eight hectares, and he secured his first investor partnership, providing the capital and confidence needed to scale. The following year marked a major milestone as the business was formally incorporated and cultivation increased dramatically to 60 hectares, transforming it from a small farm into a structured agribusiness enterprise. 

In 2025, he built on that momentum by expanding cassava production and officially launching contract farming services, creating an additional revenue stream while helping other farmers access agricultural opportunities. 

How Malum Agro Works

Malum Agro Services positions itself as an execution partner for people who want to invest in agriculture without running the farm themselves. Its offerings span six core areas:

— Contract Farming, full project management from land preparation to yield accountability

— Agro-Consulting, feasibility studies, crop and input recommendations, risk planning

— Project Management, labour supervision, input sourcing, progress reporting

— Mechanised Services, ploughing, harrowing, ridging, drone spraying, harvesting logistics

— Agri-Tech Tools, drone technology, precision farming tools, digital farm mapping

— Training & Empowerment, hands-on field experience for graduates and rural youth

Commercial contract farming projects in the company typically start at 10 hectares, although Adefuwa says smaller five-hectare pilot projects are used to test new crop varieties before scaling. Every prospective investor goes through a vetting process, because, in his words, "Agriculture is not a get-rich-quick scheme. It’s a long-term business that rewards patience, planning, and consistent execution."

The model aligns three stakeholder groups at once. Farmers gain market certainty. Investors benefit from reduced operational risk, and processors enjoy consistent supply.

Beyond the checkpoints and checklists, technology runs through Malum Agro's operations, including drone-based mapping and soil analysis used to plan projects before cultivation begins. 

However, Adefuwa is wary of hype and discourages farmers from chasing buzzwords for their own sake. For him, technology only matters if it makes farming much faster, more efficient and productive. He points to drone-spraying and irrigation-monitoring tools already being used by other Nigerian innovators as proof that the shift is underway.

The agripreneur said that growth hasn't been without setbacks. He narrated a story about a past mistake during the maize cultivation cycle where poor timing on herbicide application hurt yield. The experience reinforced a principle he now runs the company by: Proper Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.

"When you make mistakes, you learn better," he confesses. "Agriculture is always a learning curve."

A Crucial Change to Nigeria’s Farming Approach 

Prescribing an immediate action to correct Nigeria’s agriculture perception problem, Adefuwa turned to a broader industry argument. He says that agricultural policy in Nigeria should be approached as a foundation for industrial development, job creation, and economic growth. 

He believes Nigeria under-invests in agricultural extension and knowledge transfer, leaving many farmers without access to the technical support needed to improve productivity. Pointing to cassava as an example, he noted that although Nigeria is the world’s largest producer by volume, average yields still lag behind those achieved in countries such as Brazil. 

To him, leading in production is not enough because continuous innovation, research, and productivity improvements are what sustain long-term competitiveness.

Adefuwa reveals that his long-term goal is to change the narrative around agriculture and to make an impact. This vision has made him intentional about involving youth and the local workforce in the community where he operates. 

He believes that the bigger task is mindset change. Many rural youth have been conditioned to see agriculture as the last resort, and shifting that view means showing them people about their own age doing the work at scale.

As his own contribution, Adefuwa recalled how youths were trained and engaged directly as staff in a recent project done in Olorunsogo, Oyo State. 

"You can make a life out of this," he tells them, "but they need to start looking way beyond production."

Adefuwa says he is considering an agricultural foundation alongside his existing volunteer work as another avenue to increase his impact.

Advice for Graduates Considering Agriculture as a Viable Option

Asked how a young graduate with ₦500,000 should start an agribusiness, Adefuwa's answer skips the usual scripts. Rather than renting land immediately, he suggests solving one specific problem within the value chain, such as aggregation, storage, distribution, mechanisation, processing, logistics, or input supply. Buying, reselling and distributing fertiliser and other inputs at scale can generate income even long before one sets foot on a farm.