Scaling up: the app that’s transforming lives in South African fishing communities

Abalobi provides a real-time marketplace for fishers to sell their catch, while also monitoring fish populations, and the tech could go global

The 59-year-old Wilfred Poggenpoel is a fisher from Lambert's Bay, a picturesque town 170 miles north of Cape Town that's popular with surfers and home to 17,000 breeding pairs of Cape gannets. Five years ago, he made the decision to join a virtual marketplace called Abalobi, which enables fishers such as him to sell their catch directly to restaurants, retailers and consumers using a custom-built app.

I get a better price and I can sell more species now," he says. I've bought a 60-horsepower motor that I'd never have been able to afford before. I've bought a second boat." He joined, he says, because he didn't want to spend all day walking around town in the sun trying to sell fish. My quality of life has improved. I've even been able to help some old people in the community."