Innovations in the News and Around the World |
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Water and Energy for Food at COP27 |
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Scaling Climate Resilient Solutions via Innovative SMEs and WEF Nexus Approach
The event will bring forward the experiences of mobilizing innovative solutions to enhance food systems and food security based on sustainable water and energy use. Scaling these climate resilient solutions from MENA and Africa helps market value chains to transform and communities to adapt. The event will put SME projects at the center-stage, highlighting successes and lessons learned.
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Nexus Solutions for Climate-Resilient Water, Energy, Food, and Environment Security
The Water- Energy- Food NEXUS is a powerful concept to address the complexities of #climate impacts.
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The Hanging Fields of Nairobi
Half an hour away from Nairobi’s city center, a team of entrepreneurs is growing vegetables, fruit and fodder on vertical fields. What looks like a project for a space station could be the future of agriculture in Africa.
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Accessible Tech Lights a Way for Smallholder Farmers in Zimbabwe Losing Harvest
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Invest In A Sustainable Future: The Case of Green Essence
The WE4F Middle East and North Africa Regional Innovation Hub (MENA RIH) organized the ‘Invest In A Sustainable Future: The Case of Green Essence’ pitching event where the Green Essence team presented the opportunity for seed investors to invest in the company.
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How to Provide Cambodian Smallholder Farmers with a Gateway to Financial Services
Smallholder farmers are the backbone of agriculture – a key sector in Cambodia’s sustainable development. However, most smallholder farmers cannot pay for these technologies out of pocket and most banks require loan collateral that is far beyond the reach of smallholder farmers. Agrosolar shares their solution to filling the financing gap.
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Circular Economy is Climate Protection
The avocado oil manufacturer Olivado relies on climate-neutral agricultural production in Kenya.
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World Food Day with Robinson Agri
On October 16th, World Food Day is celebrated to promote global awareness and action for those who suffer from hunger and to highlight the need to ensure healthy diets for all. To learn more about contributing to sustainable food production, WE4F interviewed Robinson Agri, a Lebanese company supported by our Middle East and North Africa Regional Innovation Hub.
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Rural Women – Agents of Change in South and Southeast Asia
Sasmita Patnaik, Technical Assistance Facilitator and Gender Advisor, and Yogeeta Sharma, Communication and Knowledge Management Specialist, WE4F South and Southeast Asia Regional Hub, reflect on how the region’s innovators are adopting a better approach to increase gender equality and women’s empowerment for sustainable development and climate change mitigation.
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Kazi Yetu Advances the Role of Women in Agriculture
WE4F Innovator Kazi Yetu aims to build local value chains in Tanzania and support women in agriculture and processing. They promote the advancement of women and gender equality by paying premium prices to the women farmers that supply them and by working with them to expand their operations through technical investments.
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End-User Financing in Lebanon: The Case of Green Essence
Amidst an ongoing nationwide economic and fuel crisis in Lebanon and worldwide rising energy prices, many Lebanese businesses are struggling to stay in operation. Commodities and daily necessities are priced out of reach for the average citizen, and sustainability or environmental protection concerns are pushed to the bottom of the list. WE4F innovators work hard to alleviate the burdens on the Lebanese population. Green Essence is one of these businesses.
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S4S Technologies Creates Opportunities for Women’s Empowerment
We talked to Ms. Nidhi Pant, Co-founder of S4S Technologies, about why women’s participation in the renewable energy sector is the key to achieving widespread adoption of clean energy and reducing social inequality. Also, how S4S helps women farmers have access to needed resources and increased incomes without leaving their rural communities and towns.
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From the Roadside to the Fields
Since 2015, the Kenyan small business, Safi Organics, has been producing organic fertilizer. They’ve had great success, not only with the yields of the organically fertilized fields improving, but also with the climate benefits due to the fertilizers being biochar-based. in cooperation with the international initiative Water and Energy for Food (WE4F), production is now expanding.
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The Power of Flexible Financing: How ONergy is Expanding Access to Energy Services
As part of WE4F’s series on end-user financing, Antara Dey Bhowmik, Operations & Commercial Head of ONergy Solar, shares how they offer an extensive range of business development and financial services to improve the livelihoods of people living in rural areas in the eastern region of India.
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Pioneer Facility invests in Techno Hill to expand solar microgrids in Myanmar
The Pioneer Facility, an impact investment fund managed by Nexus for Development, signs its first investment in Myanmar with Techno Hill, a pioneering solar microgrid developer.
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How the founders of FreshR found an opportunity in the highly unorganised B2B fish and meat industry
Much has been said and written about how the pandemic outbreak in 2020 was a boon of sorts for online direct-to-customer (D2C) meat delivery startups in India. While retail consumers turned to online meat delivery, businesses were not far behind in discovering the advantages of an organised meat market. Realising this first hand was Ambika Satapathy, the Co-founder and CEO of Delhi-headquartered FreshR.
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Cold chain solutions provider New Leaf raises ₹6.15 cr in pre-Series A
New Leaf Dynamic Technologies, a cold chain solutions company, has raised ₹6.15 crore in equity funding in its pre-Series A round.
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Helping Farmers Save Dairy – How Promethean Power Systems is Tackling the Milk Waste Crisis
For the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste, we spoke with Jiten Ghelani, CEO of Promethean Power Systems. He shared with us Promethean’s vision of empowering small dairy farmers, decentralized milk chilling and cold storage solutions to eliminate food loss, and their goal of becoming an end-to-end cold chain solution provider.
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Grand Challenges Annual Meeting with WE4F
WE4F was at the Grand Challenges Annual Meeting hosting the session, “End-User Financing to Combat the Impacts of Climate Change”. SOWIT and aQysta joined in-person, while ONergy and FIN’Elle participated through pre-recorded videos. The session covered the importance of end-user financing for smallholder farmers who would otherwise not have access to climate-resilient technologies, integrating women into EUF models, and next steps.
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Invest in Southern and Central Africa through Water and Energy for Food
The WE4F Southern and Central Africa Regional Innovation Hub (S/CA RIH) is looking to partner with investors who want to change this and increase the investment threshold in the region. The innovators from this hub address the challenges that affect smallholder farmers and food value chains.
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S/SEA Hub and Women on Wings Announce a Strategic Partnership to Create an Impact on Rural Women in India
The WE4F South and Southeast Asia Regional Innovation Hub (S/SEA RIH) and Women on Wings have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to identify and support India-based WE4F-supported businesses in creating an impact in the water-energy-food nexus by focusing on women-led and women-centric business models.
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MENA Hub Partners with Al Majmoua to Promote End-User and Green Finance in Lebanon
The WE4F MENA Regional Innovation Hub (MENA RIH) and Al Majmoua are proud to announce that they are joining forces to bring farmer-oriented green finance facilities to the Lebanese market. Both parties firmly believe in the positive climate, financial, and social impacts of enabling farmers to access technologies such as solar-powered irrigation by providing easy access to end-user finance.
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WE4F and E4I: Improving Rice Production and Processing in Benin
Since November 2020, WE4F/PEEPA, and partner Energy For Impact (E4I), have been working on a project to improve rice production and processing in Benin through energy efficiency measures and renewable energy. One year later, in November 2021, the West Africa RIH Technical Advisor Michel Digbeu, had the chance to meet with the rice producers during a site visit to Benin.
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IFA/UM6P Africa AgTech Startup Showcase
Are you an Agtech entrepreneur? Do you have a solution for one of the problems facing African agriculture? Do you want to connect with professionals in plant nutrition and farming? Apply now to the African Agtech Showcase co-organized by the International Fertilizer Association (IFA) and Mohammed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P).
The startup must provide an innovative solution to improve crop yield and quality, improve soil health, improve nutrient management performance, or facilitate market access. Registration for the competition is open to startups from around the world, provided they meet the eligibility criteria.
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Food Loss and Waste Partnerships Facility
The Feed the Future Market Systems and Partnerships Activity (MSP) is pleased to invite for-profit businesses in Bangladesh, Kenya, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, and Tanzania to submit an application for co-investment through its Food Loss and Waste (FLW) Partnerships Facility. Applications will be received and reviewed in two groups, but due to limited funding, MSP will give preference to applications that are submitted by the Group 1 deadline (December 9th). MSP will consider applications from Group 2 (due date January 27th) based on the remaining funds available, if any, after Group 1 applications are considered. Applicants are highly encouraged to apply in time to be considered in Group 1.
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Private Sector Partnership Opportunities in Mozambique: Request for Applications
The Feed the Future Market Systems and Partnerships Activity (MSP) is pleased to invite for-profit businesses to apply for funding in Mozambique. MSP’s Mozambique Partnerships Facility offers businesses operating in the country the opportunity to co-invest with USAID to address the food crisis resulting from shortages of food, fuel and fertilizer as a result of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
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SDG Market Building
SDG Market Building supports businesses to invest in green tech solutions. When searching for the right solution for efficient and climate-smart technologies, getting access to the right funding option can be a challenge. We help you all the way from drafting your investment dossier to matching with the most suitable tech providers as well as finance partners.
Your company must meet the following requirements:
- Your company is registered in Nigeria or Kenya
- You are engaged in the field of agriculture or processing
- You can present a good financial track record, including at least 2 years of financial statements
- You intent to invest in efficient irrigation, post-harvest mechanization and/or agrivoltaics
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Fund for Innovation in Development
The Fund for Innovation in Development (FID) is a new initiative to support innovation that contributes to reducing global poverty and inequality. Through flexible grant funding, FID enables innovators and researchers to test new ideas, build rigorous evidence of what works, and scale the highest-impact and most cost- effective solutions.
FID accepts applications:
- for innovations in any sector, and specifically encourages applications for solutions in education, health, climate change, and gender equality
- for innovations in all low- and middle-income countries, and specifically encourages applications from the priority countries for French aid
- from nearly any type of applicant, including researchers, governments, NGOs and for-profit companies.
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Food Resilience Annual Program Statement
In support of Prosper Africa, USAID is leveraging private sector partnerships to increase food exports with and within Africa, which is urgently needed amidst the global food security crisis, made worse by Putin’s war in Ukraine. The Call for Africa Food Security & Resilience Partnerships grant opportunity offers partners the chance to work with USAID to rapidly address food insecurity and food systems resilience challenges on the African continent. We’re offering grants of $500,000 - $5 million to scale access to inputs, technologies, and food that directly respond to this crisis.
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End-User Financing and You: WE4F Releases New Guidebook to Help Innovators
The juxtaposition of the current lack of financing options and smallholder farmers’ need for end-user financing creates an opportunity for businesses looking to grow their operations, get climate-resilient innovations into the hands of those who need them the most, and improve food systems’ usage of water and/or energy. If you’re an innovator, incubator, government, investor, or other interested organization, WE4F now has a guidebook that can help you learn more about end-user financing and identify what method may work for your organization and region.
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Increasing Women’s Empowerment through Co-creation and Private Sector Engagement
Join the Feed the Future Advancing Women’s Empowerment (AWE) program for the launch of a special learning series focused on increasing women’s empowerment in agriculture and market systems through co-creation and private sector engagement.
This learning series, newly expanded for a global audience, will help USAID missions and practitioners intentionally integrate inclusion across the project life cycle of agricultural growth and market systems development programs.
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USAID at Asia Clean Energy Forum 2022
Missed USAID's sessions at Asia Clean Energy Forum this year? Don't worry - they're now available on the USAID Southeast Asia EDGE Hub's YouTube channel!
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Measuring Food Loss Among Senegalese Growing Food Businesses
The Feed the Future Business Drivers for Food Safety (BD4FS) project, funded by USAID and implemented by Food Enterprise Solutions (FES), developed food loss protocols to help food businesses identify and track food loss to better understand how it affects their bottom line. This Technical Learning Note describes our experience in applying these protocols to real businesses in Senegal to assist them to reduce food loss through the adoption of better food handling practices.
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Three Resources to Empower Youth
The skills developed in youth today will help the world build a brighter, more sustainable future. USAID’s Partnerships Incubator is bringing you the top three youth programming tools from the WorkwithUSAID.org resource library and by highlighting some incredible organizations working with the next generation of global leaders.
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