Growing Bigger – with Rent-A-Pot

RAP with plants? Sounds fun – but it’s not what you think. It is still fun, it’s just not what you think. When we say RAP we’re talking about Rent-A-Pot. An ingeniously involving new scheme featuring AutoPot Watering Systems.

Friends, fame, fortune – the dreams we all dream. Keen to expand in all areas of the aforementioned dreams, Nam Oneko of AutoPot Kenya has hit upon RAP as a means of increasing involvement in farming, supporting expansion, raising investment, and providing sensational returns. In a few short months it is already fully subscribed for 2020-21. But what is RAP?

When you Rent-A-Pot, you are allocated two easy2grow modules within Nam’s 2,000 pot greenhouse. RAP purchase the seeds and cover the cost of all farm inputs. RAP manages the entire crop production cycle for you before harvesting, marketing, and selling your produce. RAP then pays you a return on your investment. Thanks to the initial investment Nam is able to train up new cadres of young AutoPot-savvy farmers to produce crops at his facility in Uyoma, Kunya village and look towards expansion.

Yes, it is perfectly possible to strike horticultural gold single-handedly using AutoPot – either commercially or as a hobbyist. When things go well and it comes to expansion you can hook up more modules to your heart’s content. The workload is still low, along with the overheads. Going it alone is possible. But Nam believes strongly in sharing the success he’s had with AutoPot.

Nam is keen to see AutoPot-driven farms support both his and other local areas across the country. So expansion calls not just for more kit, or a larger premises, or even more workers per se; but for a wider involvement of people.

Highly popular in the local area, Nam’s scheme to identify young apprentices who he can develop into ‘Agripreneurs’ has needed little extra help. Attracting interest in investment has also proved a doddle given that each pot is rented for Ksh3,000/ (USD 30/-) and the return on investment is Ksh4,500/. Nam limited the number of pots one could rent to 20 so as to get as broad a cross section of investors as possible. Mission accomplished; RAP currently has investors in fourteen different countries.

The investment afforded to him by RAP will also support Nam’s expansion in infrastructure and, in turn, increase capacity to offer even greater investment opportunities. Nam self-funded his first two greenhouses and has enjoyed years of success with AutoPot Watering Systems. In this time he has also been stoking government interest in sustainable farming with AutoPot – proof, if it were needed, of his long-term commitment to community enhancing horticulture.