Dear Friend...

Over the past 3 months, my business partner, Adam Martinovic, and myself have conceptualised an EcoFarm Business Accelerator, as a practical response to South Africa's multiple social, economic and environmental challenges ie poverty, joblessness, poor nutrition, poor land, soil and water management.

We have identified a 15-hectare Permaculture Farm about 2 hours from Cape Town on which to pilot our concept. This farm already has much of the infrastructure required for us to get going fairly quickly, including residential buildings, workshops, warehouses, equipment, a large dam, working irrigation system and fields ready for cultivation. 

[See Flickr album here]. 

While we are confident that our concept will attract the necessary early-stage investment funding (+- R11-Million), we require a comprehensive business plan to be drawn up by Funding Connection to make this happen. 

The cost of this service is R15 900, money which we don't have to hand right now, which is why we are asking for your help in the form of a donation of at least R150 (£8 / $10 / 9 Euros). 

We envision this farm to become an open source platform where people from all walks of life will come to learn how to live harmoniously with nature, and by so doing create abundance for themselves, their families and their communities. 

[Listen to my CapeTalk radio interview here]

Once up and running, the farm will serve as a space for: 

• Incubating 5-10 Small to Medium-sized agribusinesses, by providing them with cultivation and production space, as well as a suite of business support services, accounting, marketing, packaging & distribution.  

• Delivering full-time, part-time and online courses in small business management, regenerative land management and agriculture. [Watch this short film for an idea of what we mean by this]. 

• Running a programme of workshops, seminars, leadership and adventure camps aimed at people of all ages. 

• Initiating and supporting various outreach projects in the surrounding communities.  

In addition, we aim to embark on a 360-degree content marketing strategy that we believe will generate demand for our model to be rolled out to many sites across South Africa and beyond. 

Your donation of R150 (£8 / $10 / 9 Euros) will be rewarded by: 

• an invitation to our opening event in the first half of next year or, if you can't make it, an overnight B&B stay on the farm at another date of your choosing, subject to availability.