Penn State seniors Sarah Turk of Downingtown and Chanpreet Singh of Chester Springs, both computer science majors, are part of the team that won top prize at Ag Springboard, a student business pitch competition sponsored by the College of Agricultural Sciences, writes Chuck Gill for Penn State News.

Team Bloom won the first prize of $7,500 for its pitch of a mobile application that would connect Kenya’s small produce farmers directly with wholesale buyers. The team also adjusted for the travel restrictions imposed by the coronavirus pandemic by finding a way to operate completely digitally.

The platform is expected to launch within a year. So far, students have worked on the project for two years and have already spoken with 100 wholesalers and farmers.

“Our platform gives smallholder farmers a reason to be hopeful about their future selling produce,” said Singh.

Meanwhile, West Chester native Catherine McAllister, a sophomore studying biomedical engineering, is part of Team Extrigate, which captured second place and $2,500 for its plan to use borehole drilling technology to provide affordable irrigation wells for smallholder farmers in Kenya.

Read more at Penn State News here.

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