My Morning Routine: Ali Diab, co-founder and CEO of Agriventure

Ali Diab, co-founder and CEO of Agriventure: Each week, My Morning Routine looks at how a successful member of the community starts their day — and then throws in a couple of random business questions just for fun. Speaking to us this week is Ali Diab (LinkedIn), co-founder and CEO of Agriventure, one of Egypt’s dominant blueberry growers and exporters.

Edited excerpts from our conversation:

I spent more than 10 years in finance before I ever farmed. I studied accounting at the American University in Cairo and started my career at Procter & Gamble. My work then took me around the Gulf, where I worked with one of the region’s biggest retail chains. I went on to become CFO of a listed company in Kuwait. Then in 2011, my longtime friend Karim Hendi (LinkedIn) and I decided to go into agriculture together. That’s how I got into fruits and vegetables. We started Fresh & More on the notion that we always wanted to do agriculture differently.

Agriventure started during Covid as a long-term plan. We wanted to put Egypt on the map for blueberry production. About two years later, our long-term plan accelerated and became much, much bigger. We now run multiple farms across Egypt, all relying on precision farming and agricultural tech platforms. We export more than 95% of what we grow, mostly to the UK and Europe, and sell the rest locally under our Nature’s Pick brand. In under four years, we became one of the largest growers in Africa and were ranked by Market Research and News as the 15th global rising player in Global IoT Precision Agriculture.

The two morning people in my life are my wife and my business partner. Not me, though. My three toy poodles wake me up, usually between 9 and 9:30 am. I start with a bowl of our own berries — my first quality check of the day. Then I go through the papers, overnight farm data, buyer messages, and freight updates.

Mornings are for listening, evenings are for building. For the first three hours, I read to catch up on what happened overnight. I usually don’t talk much or make any decisions. I never respond right away. I do my best thinking late at night, once the house is back to silence.

Karim and I learned early that the company works best when we split the work. We each handle what the other couldn’t do as well. He wakes up early, hits the gym at 5:30 am, and then runs operations on the farm. I take business development, finance, marketing, sales, and new varieties. We catch up for half an hour around 10 am, and I usually fill him in on everything from the night before.

My year runs on the berry season. From 1 October to 1 May, we work hard, with up to 10k people on our farms every day. The rest of the year is what we call strategy and home care. We’re not building the house anymore, just maintaining it. That’s when I take about three months on the North Coast or travel.

The gym is where I blow off steam. I go every day on the way home, never in the morning. Some people go to lose weight or build muscle. I go to burn off whatever the day piled up, so none of it follows me through the door. Walking my dogs is the other thing I never skip.

Lunch with my nine-year-old son is sacred. Unless I’m traveling, we eat lunch and dinner together as a family, and everyone plans their day around it. Weekends belong to the family, too. My wife and I try never to miss our weekly night out. At home, we keep a map with a pin and photos for every country we’ve visited together.

My days end with the news and a podcast. Nearly all our revenue comes from exports, so FX, inflation, and shipping are part of my thinking every single day. I follow financial news during the day and politics at night. Then, in bed, I put on a podcast with an Egyptian businessman and usually fall asleep before it ends.

“Your partner at work is like your wife at home,” my father always told me. They’re the two most important decisions you’ll ever make. Karim and I met as students in 1997, and trust is the most valuable thing we have. Build around your weaknesses, find someone who’s strong where you aren’t, and trust them completely. I leave my ego at the door — both at work and at home. At home, my wife is the CEO.