Tijafugo — offline-first poultry management for African farms
Overview
Built an offline-first poultry farm management platform designed for African farming conditions—unreliable internet, feature phones, and multilingual users. Tijafugo enables farmers to track production, monitor flock health, and understand profitability without depending on constant connectivity.
Piloted in Kenya with early users including smallholder farmers and cooperatives, shaping both product and usability decisions.
The problem
Poultry farmers—especially small and mid-scale operators—face systemic challenges:
- Manual records are unreliable and difficult to maintain
- Disease is often detected too late, leading to losses
- Costs and profitability are unclear without structured tracking
- Most existing tools assume constant internet access
- Decision-making is based on guesswork rather than data
My role
Sole engineer responsible for:
- System architecture and technical design
- End-to-end product development and deployment
- Product direction in collaboration with early users (farmers, cooperatives, extension officers)
- Prioritization of offline-first design and multi-channel access (mobile + USSD)
Key product & GTM decisions
- Accessibility-first
- English and Swahili support
- Chat-style data entry for ease of use
- Voice and USSD support for non-smartphone users
- Offline-first architecture
- Core functionality available without internet
- Sync when connectivity is restored
- Localized pricing model
- KES-based pricing tied to flock size and farm count
- Free beta for early adopters
- Transparent tier progression (Starter → Large Scale)
- Farmer-informed design
- Built in collaboration with real users in Kenya
- Iterative feedback shaping features and UX
Key engineering challenges & trade-offs
Offline-first synchronization
- Challenge: Ensuring data consistency with intermittent connectivity
- Approach: Designed sync mechanisms to handle delayed updates and minimize conflicts
USSD vs mobile app parity
- Challenge: Supporting feature phones with limited interaction capabilities
- Trade-off: Reduced feature set on USSD in favor of accessibility and usability
AI-assisted health insights
- Challenge: Providing useful guidance without risking incorrect livestock advice
- Approach: Scoped AI to assistive insights with a path toward veterinarian integration
Core capabilities
Health monitoring (early detection)
- Symptom logging (including photos)
- Vaccination scheduling
- AI-assisted health insights
Production & operations tracking
- Batch management with auto-generated IDs
- Breed tracking (layers, broilers, breeders)
- Egg production, mortality, and feed tracking
Financial visibility
- Income and expense tracking
- Profit/loss insights at farm level
- Exportable reports (PDF/Excel on paid tiers)
Multi-channel access
- Smartphone experience (web/mobile)
- USSD for feature phones
- Offline usage with sync
Impact & traction
- Piloted in Kenya with early adopters
- Designed for farms ranging from ~50 to 500+ birds
- Supporting both individual farmers and cooperative use cases
- Waitlist-driven early access ahead of full beta launch
What’s next
- Improve offline conflict resolution strategies
- Expand AI-assisted diagnostics with expert validation
- Scale analytics for multi-farm and cooperative scenarios
- Introduce advanced automation and reporting for larger operations