Publication database

The aim of this report is to document best practices by taking a micro-level deep dive into why women entrepreneurs applying for ‘missing middle’ funding (i.e., in the range of USD 30 000– USD 500 000) more often fail than succeed. This report focuses on the demand and supply issues related to women entrepreneurs access to finance in South Africa and Zambia. The study provides a baseline assessment of a cohort of women who participated in the Graça Machel Trust’s Women Creating Wealth (WCW), a Pan African entrepreneurship development programme whose aim is to grow businesses and transform behaviours, skills and build the confidence of women entrepreneurs.

This Discussion Paper provides examples of how a systems approach can be applied at a city level by looking at two cities – Lusaka, Zambia and Maputo, Mozambique – that have experienced positive change in their on-site sanitation sector over the last decade.

The objective of this study is to document the current situation in risk capital for agrifood businesses in Sub-Saharan Africa as evidence for related policy recommendations to governments, investment funds, technical service suppliers, philanthropists and other stakeholders. The paper summarises funds providing risk capital to agrifood SMEs in Africa, analyses the demand for risk capital and the extent to which demand and supply are matched. Finally, it identifies alternative means of financing for agrifood SMEs and concludes with policy recommendations.

Ensuring that WASH services recover costs while remaining affordable for low-income households, and reaching the city’s most vulnerable residents, is a constant balancing act. This publication illustrates that this is possible. Therefore, it explores the financial viability of six urban WASH service delivery models.

This indepth report pulls together existing research and 60 interviews with local and national impact investors to analyse the landscape for impact investing country by country in Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe. This includes over 81 non-DFI impact investors and 26 development finance institutions with over 8,000 disclosed investments.

This report highlights the size of the revenue opportunity for banks which financial inclusion represents, and reviews where banks are at in capturing this opportunity. It documents six key insights on how banks can address this market, and recommendations for how governments, donors and NGOs can enable financial inclusion.

This Toolbook is designed to support the uptake and delivery of partnerships that contribute to sustainable development in Zambia. It provides the rationale for forming these partnerships and offers a range of practical tools (below) that can help people work in partnership more effectively.

This short study illustrates the impact that adoption of efficient irrigation technology can have on smallholder farming practices and livelihoods. It analyses enabling factors for adoption and adoption benefits for different crops, including financial analysis for Burkina Faso and Zambia.

This paper is one of 13 country studies on access to energy in Sub-Saharan Africa. It describes the current situation for off-grid solutions in Zambia and identifies key policy measures to enable accelerated access to electricity.