The Business of Life with Dr King

War, Pandemic, and Plantains: One Man's Mission to End Food Insecurity with Nony Mbaezue (USA)

• Dr Ariella (Ariel) Rosita King • Season 2025 • Episode 36

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What happens when architectural expertise meets agricultural innovation? Noni Mbezwe's powerful personal story begins with childhood experiences during the Nigeria-Biafra war, where he witnessed firsthand the devastating effects of malnutrition on children and nursing mothers. This formative experience, coupled with observations during the COVID-19 pandemic that revealed dangerous vulnerabilities in global food supply chains, led him to establish Century Grain Consortium.

With operations spanning multiple continents, Century Grain Consortium takes a unique approach to food security. Rather than simply addressing immediate hunger, they've developed a sustainable model that transforms the entire agricultural ecosystem. By partnering with promising small and medium-sized businesses that have demonstrated commitment to the food and agriculture space, they provide crucial market access and capital that allows these operations to scale. Their fintech platform specifically targets youth and women farmers across Africa, the Caribbean, and Latin America, creating pathways to financial inclusion previously unavailable.

The consortium's work addresses multiple pain points in the agricultural value chain: reducing post-harvest losses through processing that extends shelf life; eliminating middlemen to ensure fair compensation for farmers; guaranteeing purchases through offtake agreements; and enhancing nutritional value during processing. Projects like their plantain processing facility in Cameroon exemplify their approach—converting what would be wasted produce into export-ready products while creating sustainable jobs and improving local livelihoods. With plans to go public within five years and strategic partnerships with social impact investors, Century Grain Consortium is positioned to reshape how we think about agriculture, food security, and sustainability across developing regions.

Whether you're passionate about food security, interested in sustainable business models, or curious about agricultural innovation, this conversation offers valuable insights into how one company is working to ensure that underserved communities gain access to nutritious food while building economic opportunity. Subscribe to learn more about transformative approaches to global challenges and the inspiring leaders behind them.

Music, lyrics, guitar and singing by Dr Ariel Rosita King

Teach me to live one day at a time
with courage love and a sense of pride.
Giving me the ability to love and accept myself
so I can go and give it to someone else.
Teach me to live one day at a time.....


The Business of Life
Dr Ariella (Ariel) Rosita King
Original Song, "Teach Me to Live one Day At A Time"
written, guitar and vocals by Dr. Ariel Rosita King

Dr King Solutions (USA Office)
1629 K St, NW #300,
Washington, DC 20006, USA,
+1-202-827-9762
DrKingSolutons@gmail.com
DrKingSolutions.com


Dr Ariel R. King:

and welcome to another episode of the Business of Life. Today we have a very special guest, Mr Noni Mbezwe. Welcome, sir.

Nony Mbaezue :

Thank you, thank you, good to see you again, doctor.

Dr Ariel R. King:

It's good to see you too. Would you please tell our audience a little bit about yourself?

Nony Mbaezue :

Well, my name is Noni Mbezwe. I live in Atlanta, georgia. I was born and raised in Nigeria, came to the United States many I run an architecture and engineering consulting firm here in Atlanta. We have affiliate offices in the US in the Southwest, and we also have sister companies in Africa also doing the same thing. We are a small to medium-sized company. Average revenue of about $100 million in terms of fees. We have hundreds of millions of construction costs that we have worked on both locally here in the United States and in some African countries.

Nony Mbaezue :

But after so many years of that, we experienced a lot of work with ministries of agriculture and river basin authorities and interface with the food growers, manufacturers of food products and worked on consulting business for them and at some point, highlighted more by the pandemic and the scarcity of food what it raised my consciousness that this might be a time to pull that consulting service out into a separate company called Century Grain Consortium to focus on addressing food insecurity and nutrition insecurity, especially in underserved communities. Hence our strategy is to partner with small and medium sized companies that have been in business for five to ten years in the food and agriculture space, with at least three years of financial statements so we can review, see how we can partner with them to scale their production and food manufacturing and engage in industrial scale production, food processing, distribution and logistics. Our company, central Grain Consortium, which I am CEO and founder, has five other directors that are quite well versed. They're all in their 60s and when we select our partners, we tend to select younger entrepreneurs that are really visionary and have cross-sectoral contacts in the industry and have done a number of things to demonstrate their commitment to the food and agriculture space. It's not a very easy line of work and we also try to work with them in training the practitioners, the small farmer, smallholder farmers and food aggregators and, as you may be aware, most of the people in that industry that work there are mostly youth and women, especially in Africa and the Caribbean and Latin America, which is our geographical concentration, and we try to work with them also to bring all those onto our fintech platform, develop for agriculture and give them access to larger markets and also to financial inclusion. So these are some of the things we do.

Nony Mbaezue :

I'm the CEO and founder, but I'm also a project director, so I have a number of projects that I'm running on the company and East Sister AE companies. So that's me, that's what I do. Ae companies so that's me, that's what I do, and I have a little bit of a personal life story that motivates me to do this. I was born and raised in Nigeria. I lived through the Nigeria Biafra war and I saw what malnutrition could do, especially to children and nursing mothers. I also have seen here in the United States. A lot of our food comes from China and some other places. That's really a little bit dangerous. The logistics aspect of it alone manifested during the pandemic. We see that there's opportunity to do what we say in our mantra. Our mantra is do good, doing good. We want to make sure that we do good anywhere we work, especially for the families and small holder farmers that are in our value chain.

Dr Ariel R. King:

That is so incredibly interesting and I think that food security is such an important subject for any nation, for any community, you know, not just those that are developing and so on and so forth. Especially, as you said, during the COVID time, we really saw the difficulties with transportation of food and the idea of local food. May I ask, how have you been able to address some of these issues about, you know, food going long ways, being picked before ripe and even other issues of food insecurity? How has your company and how have you been able to address some of these very important issues?

Nony Mbaezue :

Well, what we're doing is an ongoing process. We have started by developing certain criteria by which we develop and sign on partners. We look at their leadership and their staff. We look at their leadership and their staff. We look at what they have done in the past whether it's scalable, whether it's targeted at sustainable farming and food processing, whether they are ready to move on to the higher industrial scale activity. And then also we look at the access to finance and the access to markets. So we develop a program that will address these issues. Uh, along the line, In our joint venture and agreements we specify certain things that they have to do and what we'll do, especially bringing capital and access to market.

Nony Mbaezue :

In most situations you will realize that if a farmer is doing two hectares of land of farming and you want them to scale to five hectares, they would wonder who is going to buy the produce. You know there's a lot of post-harvest losses because of distance to markets and spoilage. So to address that, we give offtake agreement to the farmer. We also, through our fintech platform, give them access to capital so they can scale and at the same time, we believe in processing the food when it's harvested so that it will have a longer shelf life. So the transportation and all of that reduces the spoilage. So these are some of the things we're doing focusing on processing, offtake, making sure that we pay fair wages to those in the value chain and also eliminate the middleman so that they can get more for their work and also do process and value addition, which creates more sustainable jobs, you know, and also makes it possible for the shelf life of the stuff to be improved. Also, in terms of nutrition, you'll find that most of the developing nations, while there is food, the nutritional value of the food could be depleted. So we make sure that we add the nutrients in the processing so that it's something that is really, even if you have one meal a day, that you get value for it.

Nony Mbaezue :

So we address sustainability through teaching sustainable farming. We address post-harvest losses by value addition and extended shelf life value addition and extended shelf life. We also improve the life outcomes of the people in our value chain by eliminating the middleman and paying them more for their produce. And then also through our offtake agreement, we guarantee them that they get that what the farm is not losing value, that they get it, and then we also export to the United States. Currently we are working in Tanzania, Kenya, Ghana, Uganda, Rwanda. We also work in Nigeria and currently in St Vincent and the Grenadines in the Caribbean, and hopefully we just finished a study in Grenada. Hopefully, in the next quarter or so, we should sign an agreement and begin to work in that place. We'll be starting with onboarding co-ops onto our fintech platform for financial inclusion. So these are some of the things we do to address the constraints in the industry.

Dr Ariel R. King:

You do so much in your company. It's really amazing and what I really like is that also it spans. It's not just in the Americas, but also in the Caribbean, but also in Africa, and I did not realize that food can go all the way from China to Americas. I had no idea about that. So all of this is quite interesting to me. I wanted to ask about for you and your company can you please tell me, is there one or two examples that you can see how a business started or how a country started and there was food insecurity and how, through going through your particular business, what it looks like now and how it flourished, so we can have an understanding of a story of how that worked?

Nony Mbaezue :

Sure, First of all, we're able to do what we do because of our directors of our firm. One of them is Peter Guidry. He's a 40-year veteran of the food distribution and logistics logistics. He's probably the largest African-American supplier of processed foods to the US government and also including the feeding programs, the international programs, and he has a lot of experience in new product launches. Then we also have our president and chief operating officer, who is Professor Fonsa. Professor Fonsa is an agricultural economist. He has both private sector and public sector experience. He's also a professor of agricultural economics. And we also have Mr Tim McNally, who has a background in realty and business development and he has a very wide reach in Latin America and in Africa. In fact, many of the Mandela Washington Fellowship graduates that we have signed on for this came through his network and involvement with the Mandela Washington Fellowship program, which provides training and opportunities to young entrepreneurs from Africa. Then we also have a second generation livestock farmer, jacob. He's based here in the US and he distributes livestock to over 40 countries, including Africa, and he has a lot of expertise in that space. And then we have one of my longest partners in engineering, mr Curtis Dumas. He's a professional engineer with a lot of experience in environmental and water wastewater, so he provides that expertise also. Then, more importantly, we have partners that are very bright, very aggressive in what they're doing, very knowledgeable, so they make it really easy for us. For example, in Kenya we have Dr Skip, who he trained as a doctor, vet doctor, in Kenya. He's an American from New York and he came back to the US taught at Cornell and then, kind of semi-retired, moved back to Kenya and he lives there. He's aggregated a lot of acreage and doing a lot of great work. So we're partnering with him. So that's how we're able to do this. It's because of the expertise and knowledge of the individuals involved. Then, secondly, we are really lucky that we have corporations and individuals that bring a lot of the experience and connections to the Central Green Consortium. So it makes it a little easier for us to scale, easier for us to scale, and what we're doing is giving that knowledge, giving that access to markets and capital to our partners in these regions.

Nony Mbaezue :

And currently we are working, for example, in Cameroon. In Cameroon they have very fertile soil but they import a lot of their food. There's not a lot of processing that takes place just like in many other African nations. Africa produces a lot of food it has the largest body of water and land but it exports produce and re-imports it as processed goods. So, in the case of Cameroon, we have partners there and we are developing a way to make sure that we reduce the post-harvest losses in plantains and bananas. They produce a lot of it, but a lot of it goes to waste. So we are addressing that issue, working with a company that is based in Cameroon and also in London to build a factory to process the plantains, slice, fry it, freeze it and then export it to the West. So that's an example of how we are improving the livelihoods of the families engaged in that and also improving how the harvest is processed and sold. So that's a typical example, and this cuts across many of the countries in Africa and the Caribbean.

Dr Ariel R. King:

I see that there's so much extra value that your company is actually given. So what I really like is you help with the markets and also with the financing, so you have young and motivated and very talented people that don't necessarily have the access to the markets, as you were saying, and also to the financing. So I would think that that makes a very, very big difference in them scaling up yes, it does, and, uh, it also is a learning process for me.

Nony Mbaezue :

In fact, the only true farmer in our midst is Professor Greg Fonser, and probably also Jacob Clover, who grew up in a livestock family.

Nony Mbaezue :

I grew up in sustainable farming, in sustenance farming, and I also know that there's a lot of work that needs to be done related to agriculture, especially in terms of the constraints they face, which is primary infrastructure, roads, both primary and secondary roads, access to electricity, access to water, irrigation.

Nony Mbaezue :

So that's the expertise that I bring to the team, apart from executive leadership and business development, and we work to make sure that those rent-fed farms are changed into an irrigated farm so that it's not so dependent on the vagaries of weather. And also we try to bring our knowledge of working with governments in our AE services, architecture and engineering services mostly work for state and local governments, both here and in Africa, and through that knowledge we're able to engage the public sector, to partner with them in providing certain infrastructure for some of these areas where the farms are located. For example, one of the sites is now classified, has been approved as a free trade zone, so that makes it a lot easier to bring in the equipment and process and also ability to encourage other players to come onto that site. You know from international and local, so that's a part of the knowledge base that we bring to make things work a lot better.

Dr Ariel R. King:

That makes all the difference. May I ask where do you see this company going and also farmers going in various parts of the world that you work with? What do you see the future in five years and then possibly 10 years?

Nony Mbaezue :

In the next five years we hope to take the company public and also, currently we are working on a number of projects and collaborating with a social impact investor that is out of Europe A couple of them, actually.

Nony Mbaezue :

One is an investor, the other is a lender. They are focused on the agriculture, education and primary infrastructure lending. So we are hoping that before the end of this year, the several projects that we have developed in the past four years will shall have been funded and running in terms of construction, and we hope that by the time that runs another three years, we should be ready to give more people opportunity to invest and also to join us to do good. Doing good because we really believe that we are bringing soccer to some of the farmers and also trying to encourage the youth to see farming as a business, not just what mom and pop does and stay poor, but also to bring the young people back to farming as a business and also make sure that some of the regulatory requirements that are coming up in terms of deforestation and sustainability, that they're able to do that and also be ready to have traceability on their produce.

Dr Ariel R. King:

Thank you. That's really amazing, and I really love the fact that you're also looking at young people once again going back to sustainable farming and as a business, and not necessarily, as you said, just something that you do for the family, and I think that's going to make a very, very big difference. Let's see. Do you have any books that you have published that you'd like to tell the audience about, or are there other projects that you'd like our audience to know about?

Nony Mbaezue :

Well, what I've published is not relevant so much it's in public works relevant so much it's in public works. But our president has published over 300 papers and books. He actually published a book on banana and plantains. In fact, internationally he's known as the banana man and he has a book. Actually, we also have a couple of technologies that we own, uh, through one of our uh experts, uh, a technology that can basically detect pregnancy in livestock before it's manifest visually, because a lot of times when that is not known, a lot of loss of pregnancy among the livestock can happen. So this is a technology that he owns, that he has brought into century growing.

Dr Ariel R. King:

So we have a really good portion of having very intelligent and very experienced people working with us, and innovative, absolutely innovative. Yes, thank you so much, and could you please tell our audience how to get in touch with you and your company if they'd like to learn more and also those who would like to look at partnering or investing.

Nony Mbaezue :

Yes, our website is a good source of information. You can find us online at wwwcenturygccom N-T-U-R-Y-G-Ccom. You may also call me directly plus 1-404-697-1983. Send an email to info at centurygccom. You could also email me directly at nonny at centurygccom or noni at aimksgwcom.

Dr Ariel R. King:

Thank you, and you're also on LinkedIn.

Nony Mbaezue :

Yes, I can't quote the LinkedIn, but you can find me on LinkedIn, noni Mbezwe.

Dr Ariel R. King:

Thank you so much, and Noni is spelled with a Y or an I just for people to know for the email.

Nony Mbaezue :

N-O-N-Y at centurygccom.

Dr Ariel R. King:

Thank you so much, sir. Our time is finished. It goes by so quickly. I want to thank you for introducing this subject. It's so interesting, and I would like to ask you to think about coming back again, because there's so much more to explore. So thank you thank you.

Nony Mbaezue :

Thank you for the opportunity. We look forward to talking to you again. Thank you thank you.

Dr Ariel R. King:

Thank you, sir, and remember if I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, then when? That's by the philosopher, hello. And I've added if not me, then who? Thank you so much for joining us thank you stop talking.