News
15 November 2024
Farm Africa is a winner of GEF’s Challenge Program for Adaptation Innovation
Farm Africa Chief Executive Dan Collison speaking about the award at COP29.
As funding the climate challenge takes centre stage at COP29 in Azerbaijan, today Farm Africa was announced as one of 13 of the latest winners of the Global Environment Facility’s Challenge Program for Adaptation Innovation.
The Global Environment Facility (GEF) announced a total of $20 million in grants awarded to projects that will reimagine climate adaptation finance.
The GEF-backed Challenge Program for Adaptation Innovation aims to pilot and de-risk new approaches to adaptation funding, leveraging donor funding to create the conditions for comprehensive private sector engagement in overcoming the shared challenges of climate change.
“Adapting to climate change is one of the defining challenges of our time, but it also offers an undeniable opportunity. By seeding these new approaches to climate adaptation funding, we are enabling the development of innovative technologies, while reducing risk and providing the conditions needed to open financial flows and enable new investors and sectors to take action,” Carlos Manuel RodrĂguez, GEF CEO and Chairperson said.
The funding will enable Farm Africa to run an initiative titled Valuing resilience – building capacity for smallholder farmers and agribusinesses in East Africa to monetise climate resilience outcomes.
The project will bring Farm Africa and the UBS Optimus Foundation together to work to ensure climate adaptation financing gets where it is most needed: directly into the hands of smallholder farmers and small and medium-sized agribusinesses, especially those run by women and young people.
A village-based advisor gives advice on regenerative agriculture to a farmer in Kenya.
Across eastern Africa, increased temperatures, reduced rainfall and more frequent extreme weather events are reducing smallholder farmers’ yields, incomes and food security. Malnutrition is rising. Climate extremes are also fueling conflict and displacement. Smallholder farmers need to adapt to the climate crisis, but lack access to the finance needed to adopt climate-smart approaches to agriculture.
Through the project, Farm Africa will support rural communities to adopt nature-based, regenerative approaches to sustainable agriculture, build their links to markets and develop business skills, so they can develop more resilient and viable farming enterprises for financial service providers to engage with.
“Climate change is a significant threat to the lives and livelihoods of smallholder farmers in eastern Africa. However, they are receiving very little support to adapt to a climate crisis they did not create. Just 0.8% of climate finance reaches small-scale farmers. With support from the GEF, we’ll unlock and scale smallholder farming communities’ access to climate finance so they can invest in sustainable, regenerative agricultural practices that protect not just their livelihoods but the also the landscapes they live in. It’s a win-win for rural livelihoods and the health of the planet.”
Dan Collison
Chief Executive, Farm Africa
Micro-loans will offer credit to buy inputs such as drought-tolerant seeds, and support women to build businesses aggregating and selling farmers’ produce. Insurance will protect rural communities from the risk of losing everything when drought or floods strike.
Sustainable businesses like wild coffee harvesting help to protect forests in Ethiopia.
The initiative will create market incentives for rural communities not just to develop diversified, resilient rural livelihoods, but also restore healthy, functioning ecosystems.
