MSME | 6 March 2026
Firm launches corporate farm to attract large-scale agricultural investment in Nigeria
By Olusola Blessing
Origin Tech Group has launched a new agricultural investment platform known as Corporate Farm, designed to mobilise private and institutional capital into large-scale farming operations across Nigeria.
The initiative was unveiled in Lagos as part of efforts to address long-standing structural challenges in the agricultural sector that have historically weakened investor confidence despite Nigeria’s vast agricultural potential.
Executive Chairman of the company, Samuel Johnson Samuel, explained that the model targets investors with a minimum landholding of 1,000 hectares. Under the structure, investors are expected to contribute between 20 and 50 per cent equity while the company and partner banks provide the remaining capital. Participation requires a minimum investment commitment of $3 million.
Samuel added that large-scale production is also required for specialised operations such as poultry and aquaculture, where participants must raise at least 250,000 birds or an equivalent volume of fish stock.
He noted that the platform was developed to tackle the long-standing financial risks that have discouraged banks and institutional investors from supporting agriculture.
According to him, many financial institutions and pension-backed investments in agriculture have historically suffered losses, a situation the new model aims to address by introducing a more structured and predictable investment framework.
Samuel argued that the major limitation of Nigeria’s agricultural sector is not the quality of produce but the fragmented nature of farming operations, which makes mechanisation, logistics and service delivery inefficient.
He recalled that a tractor-on-demand service launched by the company about 15 years ago failed largely because farms were scattered across distant locations, making the cost of servicing individual farms unsustainable.
“We had a fantastic business model with Tractor On The Go, an Uber-style contractor service, but our farmers are not clustered. You travel 15 kilometres to service one hectare. The cost of just going there to repair a tractor was not sustainable. That is the lesson that shaped everything we are now building,” Samuel said.
The Corporate Farm platform integrates four core service components including Whole Farm, Farm for Me, Harvest for Me and Support Smallholder Farmer. Through the Whole Farm model, the company provides end-to-end agricultural services covering land clearing, ploughing, planting, farm management and harvesting. The service targets farms between 300 and 1,000 hectares while also deploying mechanised equipment and technical expertise.
Samuel described the platform as the culmination of several agricultural development initiatives the company has undertaken over the years to build a scalable investment framework for the sector.
A key component of the model is a guaranteed market structure through which the company commits to purchasing harvests ranging from one metric ton to produce valued at up to ₦500 billion. The arrangement is designed to eliminate one of the biggest risks faced by farmers and investors — the inability to sell harvested produce.
Under the investment structure, landowners and equity partners receive full operational support including land preparation, planting and the deployment of expatriate farm managers for the first two farming cycles. The company also guarantees production targets and projected returns for participating investors.
Samuel said the company will support investors through the first two harvest cycles while also training farm managers who will continue operations after the initial phase.
For farmers who do not meet the 1,000-hectare requirement, the model provides a cooperative framework that allows smaller farmers to pool land and resources to form investable agricultural clusters.
Speaking at the launch, Abisola Olusanya, Lagos State Commissioner for Agriculture and Food Systems, described large-scale commercial farming as essential to addressing Nigeria’s food security challenges.
According to her, the country’s highly fragmented smallholder farming structure is no longer sufficient to sustain its growing population or meet the demands of modern food systems.
Olusanya noted that the Federal Government’s focus on food security under Bola Tinubu makes the timing of the initiative particularly significant.
She added that Nigeria continues to struggle with high levels of food waste, post-harvest losses and persistent food insecurity despite having millions of smallholder farmers.
The commissioner stressed that the future of the sector depends on transitioning toward large-scale, commercially structured agricultural systems capable of attracting sustained investment.
She also pointed out that limited access to finance remains a major barrier to agricultural expansion, as financial institutions often lack reliable data and predictable investment models for evaluating agricultural projects.
Also speaking at the event, Bello Abubakar, President of the Maize Association of Nigeria, said the country’s agricultural potential remains largely untapped, with only about five per cent of Nigeria’s more than 80 million hectares of arable land currently under cultivation.
He called for stronger collaboration between government and the private sector to unlock the country’s agricultural land resources and accelerate mechanised farming.
Abubakar added that effective mechanization from land preparation to harvesting could solve a significant portion of the challenges facing Nigeria’s agricultural sector.
