Mrs. Omolara Adebimpe Obasi, teacher, entrepreneur and motivational speaker, is Managing Director, Divine Fish and Farm Products and President, God Is Able Cooperative Farmers Group, an umbrella body for fish farmers and allied businesses. Mrs. Obasi, who set up shop a few years after the death of her husband, looks back with nostalgia but yet thankful for taking the bold steps, which has made her independent today. She spoke with Ibrahim Apekhade Yusuf
For Mrs. Omolara Adebimpe Obasi, life has been one tough journey indeed.
She was living the good life, with a family well-fed and everything in their proper place. But all that soon fizzled out with the death of her husband in 2005, as her life literally crashed like a pack of cards and a chapter of accidents opened.
First, a mysterious fire one night razed her apartment, where she lost all her personal effects, including her school certificates, thus making the prospect of getting a new job almost impossible.
Speaking in a chance encounter with The Nation, the HND graduate of Business Administration from Ogun Polytechnic, Ogun State, (now MAPOLY) momentarily recounts the sad episode of her life.
“I was once a teacher. I taught for well over 10 years in a private secondary school. But I had to resign because the job became a routine and on top of that the salary was meagre and irregular and could hardly meet up with my family responsibility as a widow,” she recalls.
Thus, the need to meet existential needs forced her to veer into business from teaching.
“After resigning my appointment as a teacher, I went into the business of buying and selling farm produce like garri, rice, beans, yam and others. I travelled upcountry to Kano, Delta, Edo, Port Harcourt, etc. Unfortunately in 2006, I was involved in an armed robbery attack along Ogbomoso road, in Oyo State, and I lost everything. I came back home dejected and was at a quandary as to what to do next.”
A firm believer, she prayed fervently for divine grace with a view to reinventing herself. And all roads seemed to point to farming.
“Before then, I was involved in subsistence farming at home. I kept a garden at the backyard. I decided to go into farm full blast. In 2008, the Lagos State government organised catfish farming training which I took part in. In 2009, they followed up with training on the processing of catfish and I equally went for it and there and then decided to specialise in the processing of catfish instead of rearing because the latter requires intensive capital.”
Convinced that fishing is where her destiny lied, she started in 2008 by buying and processing catfish, which she packaged. Despite the initial teething problems encountered, she kept at it. She moved around offices to sell her wares.
Omolara, who can best be described as a cool, calm and collected person and has been consistently pursuing her passion in the last few years, comes across as one woman who knows what she wants and how to go about it.
A good mixer and mobiliser, the mother of three, whose youthful looks belies her 47-year-old age, recalls that her business experienced a complete turnaround with the advent of the Rural Finance Institution Building (RUFIN), a rural finance scheme for farmers and allied businesses being implemented in 12 states across the six geo-political zones over a seven-year period and specifically targets marginalised groups such as women, young people and those with physical disabilities backed with funding support from the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), a UN agency.
“We formed a cluster of farmers, under the umbrella, God Is Able Cooperative Farmers Group in 2009, through which we have been pursuing our vision of contributing to the food basket of the nation. We have been holding court and have our meeting days. When RUFIN programme came it was announced on radio, TV and the social media. I registered online.
“I received training on business planning from RUFIN. I didn’t have a plan but after the training, I put up a plan for myself. I set up a farm for myself and bought two plots of farm through RUFIN loan from First Bank Microfinance in 2011. I accessed the sum of N200, 000, added N250, 000.
“I was able to build up a farm factory through the initial loan from First Bank and followed it up with another credit facility from Bowen Microfinance, which I ploughed back into the business.”
Ever reinventing herself, she has partaken in different programmes aimed at building her skills set in the area of fish farming. “Two years ago, I went to the Republic of Benin for a capacity-building training on fish farming and I have been involved in other numerous trainings. I’m committed to farming and farming alone.”
Little wonder she spares no effort to ensure that she is actualising her vision of making catfish a stable food in every home.
The woman, who easily describes herself as a full-time farmer, says matter-of-factly: “I really don’t buy much, I eat mostly what I produce in the farm.
“I want to make my product, Alfa fish, a household name like Indomie which is in every home. My vision is to produce and sell catfish at rock bottom price, that way it is easy for anybody to make a purchase. As we speak, the product is selling itself; I don’t have a marketing team as it were. It is mostly on referrals, it sells and advertises itself.”
Interestingly, in the last three years, she has built a value chain in the business mainly through distributorship.
“God has given us the grace to cover at least six states and still counting. Abuja was where I got my first customer outside Lagos State. However, the state that is taking our goods more is Kogi State. We also have customers in Jos, Kaduna, Kano, Lokoja, Abia, Anambra. When Abuja began to buy, most of my customers I didn’t know them…
“At least 80 per cent of my customers I don’t know them. What I do is that they pay to my account and I make sure I deliver on schedule. Wholesale price is N1, 000. So the distributors now have to add their own margin at their different locations. They cover their transportation.”
Omolara, who has since acquired the sobriquet, ‘Alfa fish’, on account of her newest passion, which is rearing, processing and selling branded catfish under her own label, says business has been good.
She makes an estimated profit of N50, 000 per week, which is an average of N200, 000 monthly, which is not bad for a woman, for whom suffering became a metaphor of existence when she lost her husband.
With her foray in business, her social standing has improved significantly. Her life is back on an even keel as she is now a household name at Igbopa London, Abule Eko, an agrarian community in Ijede, Ikorodu, Lagos.
“The more my customer base grows, the more I need to expand. Right now, I produce every week. It is my desire to build a packaging room, oven centre, processing centre, changing room, the store because we’re looking beyond Nigeria.”
The next step for her, she says, is the export market. She is already in talks with NAFDAC to get the products certified.
With a can-do spirit as hers, that dream will not take much longer to materialise.
