How Did the Indigo Marketing Campaign

Affect Performances of Farmers in the

2018 farming season in Kinshasa?

Alain Musangu Mulumba

 Introduction and Context
• Lack of access to inputs was identified by ELAN as one of the
bottleneck keeping smallholder farmers from having yields that
would give them better commercial prospects that would help them
move out of poverty;
• In the second quarter of 2018, ELAN supported Indigo in its efforts to
vulgarize the utilization of insecticides and pesticides among
smallholder farmers from Kinshasa to Kongo Central (with Sanda
being the most remote site in that province).
• The objective of the campaign was to increase the number of farmers
using pesticides as well as the average volume of those already
using them.
• The campaign started in Q1 (February) and ended in Q4 (October).
 Key Research Questions

This evaluation asks the following research questions:

• Did the Indigo marketing campaign have any effects on sales volumes of
demand by smallholder farmers?
• How did performances of farmers evolve after listening to vulgarisation
messages and apply advises from Indigo teams?
• Were there important changes in performances, could one explain them
based on ELAN’s supported campaign?
• In case one found that business practice changes did occur, could one
expect retention of these practices in the future?
• Is increasing the use of pesticide leading to increases in net income of
smallholder farmers?
 Methodology and Data
To answer research questions, primary data were collected using a random sampling approach.

Data were collected using individual surveys which included quantitative and qualitative questions.
The survey approach in 2018 used a small sample of 40 farmers mostly from Kinshasa. A bigger
sample could not be used due to time.
NAIC (Net Attributable Income) determination: We compared samples of farmers between two
subsequent seasons (Current, with pesticides and previous, without pesticides). It was not possible
to look at samples of users versus non-users because of absence of sufficient data from non-users
(only 5 people in the whole sample and less usable as not all of them farmed the same vegetable).

NAIC = (Endline net profit of benef—baseline net profit of benef)

Data Limitations: Sample was only available for Kongo Central area while the campaign was
undertaken covering also Kinshasa.
Data analyzed: Data were analyzed in light of main logframe indicators:
1.Percentage of people with Business Practice change;
2.Percentage of people with Business Performance;
3.People with NAIC and NAIC amount.
 CATEGORIES OF BENEFICIAIRIES, OVERLAPS AND
BUSINESS PRACTICE CHANGE
Overlap between Indigo and
Ceprosem farmers
•
• Beneficiairies in the sample were found to include different
categories:
• A) All peole who stated using insecticides and pesticides from
Indigo had already used Ceprosem seeds in the past. In the
sample, 36 people stated to have used Ceprosem previously,
among which were included the 31 Indigo users in the current
season.
• What still keeps INDIGO as a standalone intervention the fact
that some users, while also using CEPROSEM triggered some
replications, as it will be shown later. Hence INDIGO will mostly
lead to indirect beneficiairies.
• B) The sample had 77.5% Indigo and Ceprosem users and 22.5%
who used Ceprosem and not Indigo pro
•
1 Indirect beneficiairy for 1 direct
beneciary.
• With overlap of 100% with ceprocem farmers, beneficiairies only come from replication/imitation:
• Sample shows that 65% of those who are using Indigo products for the first or second season spoke to 1.8 persons
of which 1.6 eventually used the products of which only 1.01 had some evidence of effective use (based on
declarations of interviewed people).
• Hence, we have 1 indirect beneficiairy for each direct beneficiairy or first time user, by the way of mouth to hear.
 Indigo Sales and Business Practice Change
Following the Marketing Campaign
Volume Percentages
Total liters sold in 2017 16021.95
Total liters sold with ELAN support 27486.39
Gross Differential 11464.44 71.55%
Anticipated growth prior to the campaign 30%
Attributable Growth 41.55%
Attributable volume 6657.86

Comparative sales of Indigo between 2017 Business practice change comes from attributable
(without support) and 2018 (with marketing volumes of 6657.6 Liters. If we make the
support) assumption that smallholder farmers used 3.6
4500 liters per year, 1849.3 farmers bought the
4000 pesticides in 2018. Considering overlap with
3500 Ceprosem and replication, we can assume that
3000
these 1849 farmers also made it possible for the
2500
2000
same number to replicate. Hence, Business
1500 Practice Change can be assumed for 1849 farmers
1000 who are replicating. Nevertheless, one should
500 also verify if those replicating are also exempt
0
from overlap with those counted for CEPROSEM.
• ..
2017 2018
 BUSINESS PERFORMANCE
• Meaning : One or all of:

Increased Yields, Financial productivity, Improved

quality of produces, More attractive sales
conditions
Out of those
al who
Business Performance In the Changed
sample Practice

People who state they did NOT get better results after using
INIDIGO products 9 538
People who state they had better results after copying from
users(70.9%) 22 1311
Business Performance with CEPROSEM overlap 31 1311

97.5% of those using Indigo pesticides said that they were offered better prices compared to
situation when they were not using products.
NET INCOME ATTRIBUTABLE (NAIC)
PER ACTUAL AVG
LAND SIZE
PER HECTAR
0,04 (for
beneficiaries only)

Difference between ENDLINE -BASELINE Net Profit

Per HECTARE
ENDLINE (net BASELINE (net DIFFERENCE DIFFERENCE (ACTUAL
result) result) (NAIC/Hectare) NAIC)

Tomatoes NAIC 168 529.01 149 830.45 18 698.56 764.77$

Leeks Naic
6 688.39 6129.99 558.40 26.14$
(ciboule)
 Conclusions and Recommandations
• 1 It appears that people who used Indigo inputs managed to have greater net profits
compared to the previous season. However, considering the fact that these farmers are
also using CEPROSEM seeds, these net profits embody more than just NAIC related to
Indigo pesticides adoption. The NAIC from tomatoes and leeks adds up to 790$, with
tomatoes being most rewarding.
• 2 Note that the above NAIC analysis could be deepened by looking at the spread between
baseline net profits of beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries compared to endline spread
between net profits of beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries. The volume of data in this
sample together with the break down of different types of vegetables, makes it impossible
to follow this approach.
• 3. Nevertheless, one could also try to understand if tomatoes were rare during the survey
(off season), such that their prices were high and that in normal time its related NAIC
would be in the region of the ones from leeks (26$) and the one measured for CEPROSEM
seeds users (39 per season).
• 4 In the future, one could consider making tripartite agreements between Ceprosem,
Indingo and a technical player (such as ELAN) to take advantage of synergies among
different actors. Hence, combining actions of different actors (CEPROSEM and INDIGO) on
the same beneficiaries does multiply the NAIC substantially particularly when one consider
off season (counter season) opportunities.
• 5 Data also show retention rate of 100% among those who started using INDIGO products
and this remains below the 90% retention rate used for AGNP sector as whole.