TruStory
GrowPact Kitale is a leading horticultural enterprise based in Kitale, Kenya, and has grown into one of the country’s foremost providers of professional seedling propagation and horticultural services. Founded in 2016, the company was established with a simple but powerful vision: helping farmers achieve better harvests by giving every crop the best possible start.
Today, GrowPact produces almost 800,000 high-quality vegetable, fruit and herb seedlings every week, supplying commercial growers, medium-scale farms and thousands of smallholder farmers across Kenya. Over the years, the company has evolved into a complete horticultural solutions provider through six complementary business units: Seedlings, Tissue Culture, GrowPact Academy, Farm Inputs, Technical Advisory Services and Demonstration Farms.
By combining innovation, technical expertise and hands-on farmer support, GrowPact has become an important link between international seed companies and Kenyan farmers, making high-quality planting material both affordable and accessible. Over the years, the company has served more than 20,000 farmers across Kenya while strengthening resilient food systems and demonstrating that professional seedling production can be both commercially successful and socially impactful.
Joshua Mugendi, co-founder and Director of GrowPact, is a biotechnologist with a PhD in Biotechnology from Kenyatta University. During his work as a research scientist at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), he recognised that access to quality planting material was one of the biggest barriers to increasing productivity among Kenyan farmers. Together with his wife, Maicy, he set out to build a business that could fundamentally change the way farmers access healthy, high-quality seedlings.
In 2016, Joshua and Maicy founded GrowPact Kitale with the ambition of building a professional horticultural business that would transform Kenyan horticulture. Around that time, Truvalu joined as an early-stage investment and co-entrepreneurship partner, providing patient capital, governance support, strategic guidance and access to international expertise. Together they transformed GrowPact from a promising start-up into one of East Africa’s leading commercial seedling businesses
Maicy Mugendi, co-founder and CEO, combines her background in Mathematics, Computer Science and Applied Statistics with a strong passion for empowering farmers. Her ambition has always been to make professional horticulture profitable, attractive and accessible, especially for young entrepreneurs and women. Under her leadership, GrowPact has built a culture centred on quality, innovation and customer success.
GrowPact demonstrates how professional horticultural entrepreneurship can create lasting impact across people, planet and profit.
People: Over the years, GrowPact has served more than 20,000 farmers with quality seedlings, agronomic advice and practical training. Better seedlings lead to higher yields, lower production risks and improved household incomes. The company has also become an important employer in the region, creating quality jobs for young professionals while actively promoting female leadership. Today, women are strongly represented throughout the organisation, not only in senior management but also in middle management and across the wider workforce.
Planet: Healthy, disease-free seedlings and climate-smart production methods help farmers use land, water and agricultural inputs more efficiently. Through its Tissue Culture laboratory, farmer training programmes and continuous innovation, GrowPact contributes to more resilient agricultural systems and sustainable food production across Kenya.
Profit: Since its establishment, GrowPact has successfully diversified its business through six complementary business units: Seedlings, Tissue Culture, GrowPact Academy, Farm Inputs, Technical Advisory Services and Demonstration Farms. Supported by long-term partnerships with organisations such as Viscon and leading international seed companies, the company has built a scalable and financially sustainable business that continues to grow.
Although Truvalu has exited GrowPact Kitale, the story does not end here. The success of the Kenyan business has become the foundation for GrowPact Global, an international cooperative established by GrowPact Kitale, Truvalu and several leading Dutch horticultural companies to replicate this proven business model across Africa.
Expanding new nursery developments into additional countries, Growpact Global supports local entrepreneurs in establishing profitable commercial seedling nurseries through a complete ecosystem of knowledge transfer, business development, technical support and access to international partners. As a founding member of the cooperative, GrowPact Kitale continues to play a central role as the Centre of Excellence, providing practical training, technical expertise and entrepreneurial coaching to the next generation of nursery businesses across the continent.