Publication database

Based on interviews with movers and shapers involved in off-grid electrification projects in Africa and Asia this paper looks at how standalone electricity and mini-grids can increase access to electricity. It opportunities and challenges and comes up with a five-point plan to accelerate electrification.

This paper provides examples of how 2SCALE tackled youth inclusion in its partnerships. 2SCALE has been experimenting with various options to support young producers and entrepreneurs in the agribusiness sector. Making agriculture interesting to youth requires making it attractive and remunerative by having access to land, finance and technologies in order to modernise. Besides production another alternative for youth inclusion was explored: specialised service delivery to value chain actors.

This report aggregates the voices of 6,000 Kenyan farmers interviewed between June 2020 and May 2021. They relate their lived experience during the Covid-19 pandemic and how livelihoods were adversely affected by supply chain disruptions and government lockdowns. 

This report provides discussions with eight agricultural development organisations: Technoserve, SNV, Farm Africa, Self Help Africa, One Acre Fund, Twin and Twin Trading, ACDI/VOCA, and FANRPAN, that are linking smallholder African farmers to markets. It shares the organisations' perspectives on the role of enterprise in future food security and nutrition; the experiences and challenges; and recommendations to G8 leaders on how to embed enterprise development and solutions more effectively into the post-2015 agenda.

This case study reviews social enterprises operating in the agriculture and health sectors in Kenya. It considers how the lack of a widely-accepted social enterprise definition influences activity in Kenya, and it identifies niches within which agriculture and health sector social enterprises are operating.

As is the case elsewhere, in Africa, many people depend entirely on food systems for employment and incomes as well. For these reasons, building resilient and sustainable food systems is crucial to ensuring sustainable economies and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Agenda 2063 Goals. However, Africa remains food insecure, accounting for 256 million of the world’s 795 million people suffering from hunger. Against this challenge, this 2021 African Agriculture Status Report (AASR21) provides evidence and insights on the prospects of achieving resilience and sustainability in Africa’s food systems.

This note illustrates how water, sanitation and hygiene 'WASH' service provision can be approached in a way that fosters inclusion, promotes equality, and places the concerns of women and girls at the centre of programme planning and implementation. It outlines the example of establishing communal sanitation facilities in Maputo (Mozambique) and Naivasha (Kenya).

This study focuses on characterising the availability, price and market penetration of electric off-grid lighting products in Kenya, based on a survey of retail vendors in three towns. It details key findings which include that LEDs continue to dominate the market, and that there are widespread quality problems for low-cost rechargeable torches.

This guide to finance is aimed at social enterprises that need to access funding to grow and scale their enterprise. It has been designed to help social enterprises navigate their way through what is available and finding the most appropriate source of funding for their unique business.

This paper extracts lessons learned in working with informal finance institutions. It is designed for practitioners working to address the gap between supply and demand in agricultural finance, and is intended to support efforts to unlock capital for smallholder farmers and rural entrepreneurs.