Online retailer Jumia has announced the findings of research it conducted into the composition of business that trade on its platform in Kenya. The company has revealed that its survey from December 2016 established that accredited small and medium enterprises hold the the lion's share of products on its platform at 80%. Many of the business have only recently made their first ever online sale according to Jumia.

Sam Chappatte, Managing Director of Jumia Kenya says the number of SMEs leveraging the platform grew by 45% in 2016 although he would not divulge the total number of business they serve.

"We have seen a spike in the number of merchants joining our platform in recent months. This is great news for customers, as it means more choice of products and will lead to better prices. It also proves that our platform offers a great money making opportunity for professional, ambitious vendors of all sizes."

Chappatte says the growing number of merchants is due to Jumia opening up its platform to vendors in new categories (like Beauty) and retailers rushing to join the platform ahead of Black Friday on the 25th of November 2016.

Jumia also revealed that the online marketplace is rapidly diversifying into new categories such as consumer goods which has increased by more than 100% year on year, beauty which experienced and 80% surge and baby, kids and toys which registered a 44% rise.

Categories such as automotive, books and stationery have not grown in their appeal according to Jumia because "most motor vehicle owners want to buy car parts and have them fixed at the garage they frequent. Kenya has a poor reading culture as a result books don't sell in numbers."

Robinson Murage, Communications Manager at Jumia Kenya says the online retailer plans to triple the number of retailers as part of a recruitment campaign campaign over the next three months.

"To help small businesses further grow, we have launched a project dubbed #GrowWithJumia that we designed to educate and equip retailers with the technological knowledge to sell online. Jumia will allow them to sell on the platform and benefit from its large customer base taking only a minimal commission of 1% on their sales for a 3 month incubation period. In this formative period, Jumia will offer weekly payment terms (to help them recycle their cash) and is working to facilitate their financing needs."

Anne Kirima, Chair of the Kenya Investment Authority has lauded the impact of ecommerce in the country following the release of Jumia's research which corroborate findings by global marketing firm AC Nielsen that Kenyan consumers spent more than 10B KES on online shopping platforms in 2016, an increase to the 2.4B KES figure according to the Communications Authority of Kenya for 2014.

"By helping small businesses grow and creating employment for thousands of Kenyans, e-commerce contributes immensely to Kenya's economy. The fact that sellers can sell from the comfort of their homes without opening expensive stores is pretty impressive."

Jumia also recounted some of the niggling challenges to greater growth in e-commerce, including slow internet penetration, technological knowledge and insecurity in remote areas of Kenya.