South African agri-tech startup Divisi is seeking to change how smallholder farmers make planting and production decisions by using field-specific data to determine what crops are suitable, when they should be planted and how farmers can manage their production cycles.
Founded in 2026 by Isaac Chikutukutu, the platform combines soil, climate and terrain information to assess the suitability of more than 70 crops for an individual farmer’s field.
Instead of relying on broad weather forecasts or assumptions based on neighbouring farms, Divisi analyses the precise location of a farmer’s land and converts the results into practical farming tasks.
The startup says its technology could help farmers reduce production losses, improve yields, build verifiable farming records and potentially gain better access to agricultural finance and insurance. Just one month after launch, Divisi has reportedly attracted 500 active users.
What to Know About Divisi
Divisi is a farm management platform designed primarily to help smallholder farmers make better decisions about what to grow and how to manage their farms.
Divisi’s founder, Isaac Chikutukutu, identified a gap between sophisticated agricultural data and the everyday information available to small-scale farmers.
Instead of providing general recommendations for an entire district or province, Divisi analyses an individual farmer’s actual field.
A farmer maps the boundaries of the farm once, after which the platform evaluates more than 70 crops against the field’s soil characteristics, historical climate conditions and terrain.
The system then determines the suitability of different crops and identifies appropriate planting windows before converting the farming cycle into dated tasks.
According to Chikutukutu, the platform is designed to make complex agricultural analysis available on a farmer’s smartphone rather than requiring specialist equipment and expertise.
“Divisi computes agronomy for one farmer’s actual field, rather than their district.”
How Divisi Uses Data to Recommend Crops
At the heart of Divisi is the Global Agro-Ecological Zones methodology developed by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
The methodology assesses agricultural suitability by progressively examining factors that influence crop performance, including temperature throughout the growing cycle, water availability relative to crop requirements, soil chemistry and terrain.
Divisi applies this established scientific approach to a farmer’s specific field, allowing the platform to determine which crops are more or less suited to the conditions there.
The startup says its system is deterministic, meaning that the same field and crop parameters should consistently produce the same result.
This distinguishes the platform from generative artificial intelligence systems that produce recommendations based on language models.
Chikutukutu said the underlying analysis has existed for decades but has traditionally required specialised geographic information systems and resources.
“It is deterministic, the same field and the same crop parameters return the same answer every time, and every score names the factor that limited it.”
“No part of a recommendation is generated by a language model.”
Turning Farming Decisions Into Action
Divisi’s technology is designed to go beyond telling farmers which crops are suitable. Once the platform has assessed a field and identified potential crops, it determines when the planting window opens and closes and translates the crop cycle into specific, dated jobs.
This approach is intended to address a common challenge among smallholder farmers who may have limited access to formal agricultural training and precise, location-specific information.
Chikutukutu argues that conventional weather information is often too broad to support field-level decisions, with farmers frequently receiving forecasts covering entire provinces or regions.
In such circumstances, farmers may rely on what neighbours planted successfully in previous seasons rather than making decisions based on their own fields.
Divisi seeks to replace that uncertainty with data-driven planning that can give farmers a clearer roadmap from planting through the production cycle.
“So a season is closer to a coin flip than a plan.”
The founder added that farmers often receive information that is “too broad to act on,” leaving many to “copy whoever did well last year, and follow the herd.”
From Farm Records to Access to Finance
Beyond crop recommendations, Divisi is also attempting to address the information gap surrounding smallholder farmers’ production histories.
Many farmers still rely on paper records or do not systematically document their production costs, yields and financial performance.
This can make it difficult for farmers themselves to determine whether a particular crop or farming season was actually profitable.
More importantly, the absence of verifiable production records can make it difficult for lenders and other financial institutions to assess agricultural risk. Divisi intends to help farmers build digital records of their farming activities and performance.
Those records could potentially provide agricultural financiers and insurers with more reliable information when assessing farmers. The broader objective is therefore to connect improved farm management with opportunities for finance and growth.
“An agri-financier looking at a farmer with no training credentials, no verifiable production history and no financial record has no way to price the risk, so they price it high, or they don’t lend at all.”
By helping farmers increase yields while documenting their performance, Divisi aims to make agricultural activity more visible and verifiable across the value chain.
Free Platform for Farmers With a B2B Revenue Model
Despite being designed for farmers, Divisi says it will not charge farmers for using the platform. Instead, the startup plans to generate revenue through its Divisi Partner programme, under which businesses that already work with farmers can pay for authorised visibility into relevant agricultural information.
Potential customers include outgrower schemes, agro-processors, exporters, agricultural input suppliers, financial institutions and insurers.
Government agencies, agricultural extension services, research institutions and registered NGOs will receive access for free, according to the company.
The model is based on businesses paying per active enrolled farmer rather than charging individual smallholders. Divisi also says farmers’ data will not be sold and that access to information for commercial partners will be based on farmer consent.
“Farmers never pay, every feature free, permanently, and we don’t sell farmer data.”
The startup says its B2B model is intended to create a commercial pathway for the company while keeping its core agricultural tools accessible to the smallholder farmers it is designed to serve.
Eyeing Research Partnerships and Global Expansion
Divisi launched without external investment and is now seeking partnerships and funding to expand its operations.
Chikutukutu said the startup spent the past year building the product instead of raising capital, with the aim of developing something that could be demonstrated before approaching investors or grant providers.
The company is now pursuing grant applications and B2B customers while also seeking a research institution, NGO or development agency willing to conduct a trial of the platform.
According to Chikutukutu, Divisi is prepared to make its methodology, parameter tables and anonymised data available for such research. The startup says it already has 500 active users about a month after launch and is targeting expansion beyond Southern Africa.
Its underlying datasets, including global soil, climate and elevation information, are intended to allow the platform to operate across different markets without requiring a completely new data infrastructure for every country.
“Africa is the focus and SADC is where the roots are, but the tool works anywhere by design.”
Chikutukutu said that if a farmer in countries such as Peru or India maps a field, “the cascade runs,” reflecting the company’s ambition to build an agricultural technology platform that can eventually serve farmers beyond its South African roots.
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