Academia

What RIMAI teaches, and how institutions can adopt it.

A twelve-module agribusiness curriculum built on South African value chain research and dated data for five markets, aligned to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and to ISO standards.

Partner as a university See the curriculum The standards

The curriculum

RIMAI is a 14-day course of 12 modules: 11 Core Course modules, then module 12, where you choose your Major and complete your Capstone on it.

Every module answers one commercial question, sets the South African benchmark against Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana and Namibia, links to its Library sources and Dictionary terms, and ends with a task on the student's own land that feeds a named calculator.

12modules

20Majors

186Dictionary terms

Module 1: The Farm as an Asset

What is my land actually worth as a business asset, and what would make a bank take it seriously? Read the module

Module 2: Money for the Farm

Where will the money come from, what will it cost, and how do I stop one bad season or a price swing from wiping me out? Read the module

Module 3: Productivity Economics

Which inputs, machines and technology actually pay for themselves on my farm, and which only look good? Read the module

Module 4: Getting to the Buyer

Who will buy what I produce, on what terms, and how do I choose the buyer before I choose the crop? Read the module

Module 5: Logistics and Cold Chain

What does it cost to get my product from the farm to the buyer in sellable condition, and will that cost eat my margin? Read the module

Module 6: Standards and Market Access

Which certificates, tests and disease rules stand between my product and the buyer who pays most, and what does it cost to pass them? Read the module

Module 7: Trade and Policy

How do government decisions on reserves, imports, exports and trade agreements move the price I will be paid, and how do I plan around them? Read the module

Module 8: Value-Add and Processing

Should I sell what I grow as it is, or turn it into something worth more, and when does processing actually pay? Read the module

Module 9: Climate, Water and Resource Risk

What can drought, water shortage and land degradation do to my business, and how do I build the venture to survive them? Read the module

Module 10: People and Industry Structure

Who will do the work, what do buyers expect of how I treat them, and which industry bodies and groups shape the business around me? Read the module

Module 11: People, Community and Labour

Who will do the work, what will they cost, how do I lead them fairly, and how does the community around my land gain from the venture? Read the module

Module 12: Major and Capstone

The student chooses one of twenty commodity Majors in five faculties, studies its six units (industry, market structure and prices, imports and exports, value chain, market access, entry route), and builds a costed venture plan on it for real land. See the Majors

How it is assessed

A plan, not a quiz

Students are certified on a costed venture plan for real land, scored against a fixed nine-criterion rubric with a pass mark of 80.

Read the rubric

Gates before marks

Readiness, own-figures and integrity gates protect what the certificate means to a lender.

The designation

Graduates become a RIMAI Certified Agribusiness Professional in their Major and country, verifiable by reference code.

Partner as a university

Endorse the standard. Co-issue the certificate. The platform does the rest.

A university or college can endorse the RIMAI Certified Agribusiness Professional and co-issue it to its students. The learning, the assessment and the certificate register stay on the RIMAI platform; the certificate carries the university's name alongside RIMAI.

Talk to us about endorsement See the standards

1Review the curriculum and the rubric

Your faculty reviews the 12 modules, the Majors, the Capstone and the nine-criterion rubric. Nothing in the standard changes per institution, which is what makes it worth endorsing.

2Sign the endorsement

The university endorses the RIMAI Certified Agribusiness Professional as a standard it recognises. The teaching, the assessment and the certificate register stay on the RIMAI platform.

3Enrol your students

Students learn on RIMAI, free, in 14 days. The university buys certification codes in bulk for its cohort.

4Supervise the Capstones

Your lecturers can supervise their students' venture plans before they are submitted. Assessment is against the same rubric as every other plan.

5Co-issued certificates

A student who passes receives a certificate carrying the university's name and mark alongside RIMAI, with one reference code a lender can verify on the RIMAI register.

6Credit and recognition

The university can grant credit or advanced standing for the designation in its own programmes.

How institutions can adopt RIMAI

Free to teach. Paid only to certify.

The lessons, Dictionary, Library and Toolkit are free for any institution to use with students. Certification codes are available to institutions in bulk.

1Teach RIMAI as a short course

Run the 12 modules as a certificate short course for agriculture, business or development students, with RIMAI certification as the exit assessment.

2Embed it in a degree or diploma

Use the Core Course modules inside agricultural economics, agribusiness management or entrepreneurship programmes, and the Capstone as a project module.

3Recognise the certification for credit

Accept the RIMAI Certified Agribusiness Professional designation for credit or advanced standing in your own programmes.

4Use the Toolkit in the classroom

Teach enterprise budgets, cash flow, break-even and risk with the same calculators that banks license, on real country data.

5Supervise Capstones

Have your lecturers supervise students' venture plans and nominate them for certification.

6Research with the data layer

Use the dated, sourced data layer across five markets for teaching cases and student research.