Publication database

The Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) launched the Advancing Women’s Empowerment Fund (AWEF) in 2019 with support from the Visa Foundation and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The overall goal of AWEF-funded projects is to address the gender financing gap for women-owned small and growing businesses (SGBs) in developing economies. The first round of grantmaking, AWEF Asia, funded eight entrepreneur support organizations (ESOs) in Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar, the Philippines, Pakistan, and India, as well as programs serving the region as a whole. This report summarizes the lessons learned from these grants.

FutureWater’s ThirdEye was a SWFF-supported infrared flying sensors project that created a group of flying sensors operators equipped with tools to analyze near infrared imagery in order to help farmers to make better decisions concerning the use of their limited resources, such as water, seeds and fertilizers. This report analyses the results obtained by the monitoring and evaluation field intern who conducted an evaluation survey in July and August 2018 in Mozambique, after the project had been active there for 3 years.

The Ethiopian Horticulture Producers and Exporters Association (EHPEA), IDH, The Sustainable Trade Initiative, the Floriculture Sustainability Initiative and Business for Social Responsibility have invested in gender interventions on Ethiopian floriculture farms within the Empowering the Source program.

Together with our partner Fair & Sustainable Consulting, we conducted research to test that gender interventions in Ethiopian flower farms have lead to satisfied workers leading to improved performance of the business. This is the full report.

This compendium brings together 15 practical examples of how individual companies and/or multi-stakeholder initiatives are aiming to address human rights impacts and, at the same time, are showing great promise in delivering meaningful contributions to the SDGs. The report is organized around four issue areas, illustrating how they connect to the SDGs: forced labor, living wages, gender equality and land rights.

Case study on the Youth Initiative for Community Empowerment (YICE), an eco-inclusive enterprise that provides a agricultural services to smallholder farmers to improve their livelihoods. YICE has trained a group of farm agents to act as YICE representatives and community leaders. Innovative mobile technology provides smallholder farmers with access to key information on trainings, quality farm inputs,  and fair market prices for produce.  YICE aims to use this information and the provision of microloans to empower the local community to make better, more informed decisions at various levels of the farming value chain.

Case study on Unique Quality Product Enterprise (UQE). UQE's business model is based on a market-leading approach to promote the production and processing of the cereal grain fonio. Fonio was once a major food crop across West Africa and is known for is nutritional value, taste and adaptability to local climate and soil conditions. However, the introduction of rice and other cereal crops largely replaced fonio. UQE believes in fonio’s commercial potential and identified community members who were still growing the crop for local consumption. The enterprise engaged with local landholders and wider communities to gain access to infertile, unused land for women farmers. UQE promotes the expansion and harvesting of fonio crops using traditional methods. 

The Zimbabwean dairy subsector currently remains strained by a serious shortage of skilled and experienced technical staff as well as by other constraints. This study makes recommendations to address these issues.