Creating opportunities for African smallholder farmers through innovative financing and private sector partnerships

Agriculture is a critical sector for strengthening food security and scaling sustainable growth in developing countries. To fully tap into the sector’s potential to make farmers more resilient, we need significant investment and private sector involvement.??

Estimates suggest small and medium sized agricultural enterprises (SMEs) in Africa need more than USD220 billion/year to effectively respond to forecasted climate impacts and meet the demands of a fast-growing population.??

Projects like AICCRA and its partners in the public sector cannot meet this challenge alone – the private sector must be an ally. ?

This month, we’re sharing stories of our work to close the gap between the private sector and agricultural investments by addressing the challenges of investment risks and the lack of data and metrics through building networks and capacity-building accelerator programs.???

AICCRA clusters encourage partnerships between the private and public sectors to strengthen food systems and promote inclusive growth.???

Successfully de-risking support for Zambian agriculture SMEs

The AICCRA Zambia Accelerator Program offers a win-win solution for SMEs and investors alike - showing how science can be used to catalyze finance into climate-smart agriculture for meaningful change.

Since its launch in February 2022, AICCRA and partners have worked closely with a cohort of 14 Zambian agribusinesses, who we grouped into five innovation ‘bundles', each focused on a different value chain or challenge specific to Zambia’s agriculture.

The consolidated efforts of the AICCRA Zambia Accelerator partner portfolio has benefited the livelihoods of over 118,000 Zambian farmers (36% of them women) and attracted an additional 500,000 USD in grant funding from a USAID -led global crisis-relief fund that invests in rapid solutions for food insecurity.

The AICCRA Zambia Accelerator program shows how science can be used to catalyze finance into climate-smart agriculture for meaningful change.

The piece where I think that AICCRA really adds value to our business, in addition to partnering us with organizations like Lima Links , is also introductions on the financing side. They’ve got some great relationships there, but they can also bring to the project their capacity to measure our impact. - Russell Lyseight , Managing Director at VITALITE Zambia

Business models that address bottlenecks of access to finance in Mali

Mali is a landlocked country in the Sahel region of West Africa, where rainfed farming provides food and income for more than two-thirds of the population of nearly 21 million people.

Highly variable rainfall patterns, droughts, and shorter growing seasons pose major challenges to food production, nutrition, and the livelihood of smallholder farmers. Better irrigation is desperately needed so farmers can continue to produce food as dry spells get longer in a changing climate.

New business models with private sector partners like EcoTech Mali are making solar-powered irrigation technologies more accessible to thousands of farmers.

AICCRA is scaling it to reach even more.

Scaling climate smart business models through gender-smart investment in Senegal

In 2022, following an open call in Senegal, 20 entrepreneurs (17 women, 3 men) were selected from 250 applicants to participate in a capacity building program with AICCRA and Women's Investment Club (WIC) Senegal for small and medium enterprises working to scale climate-smart agriculture (CSA) and climate information services (CIS).

Of the 20, up to five entrepreneurs will now be selected to go through to the next stage of the program and be awarded a 'derisking' grant of up to USD 25,000 - based on recent presentations given to an expert jury in Dakar.

The entrepreneurs were judged on business development, investment readiness, and the degree to which they address climate-smart agriculture (CSA) and climate information services (CIS) challenges and opportunities.

Stay tuned for the announcement of the grant winners, coming soon!

Here's local media coverage of the event (in French):

Measuring metrics that matter for smallholder farmers

The public and private sectors are increasingly being asked (or even required) to report on indicators and metrics that relate to the impact of their investments on climate change adaptation within their programmes, projects, or products.

We know metrics measuring climate adaptation can attract further private sector investment to support climate-smart agriculture in Africa, but combining resources and intelligence to develop these metrics will be imperative.

In a new coalition of partners, the CGIAR Hub for Sustainable Finance is developing science-based pipeline screening tools with—among others—the AICCRA project and the African Enterprise Challenge Fund ( AECF ) to support cost-effective implementation of climate-smart agriculture.

Here's Tess Russo, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation , expanding on the role of metrics in climate adaptation and how it connects to smallholder farmers:

Consultancy: Communications Specialist, West Africa

AICCRA is hiring a Communications Specialist on a consultancy basis to support our team in West Africa.

Consultants must be bilingual in English and French, ideally based in the region (though the consultancy can be performed remotely).

Please share this opportunity with your networks!

Read all of these stories and more on our news page or follow us on social media (@CGIARAfrica) for ongoing updates.

Accelerating Impacts of CGIAR Climate Research for Africa (AICCRA) is a project that helps deliver a climate-smart African future driven by science and innovation in agriculture. It is led by the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT and supported by a grant from the International Development Association (IDA) of the World Bank.