MS Innovation Lab

Empowering Smallholder Farmers Through Financial Innovation and Market Connectivity. As Africa increasingly faces the impact of climate change, food security will become a primary focal point for policymakers and market participants. Lack of food would cause severe disruption and instability. Smallholder farmers are responsible for most of the local agricultural production, and yet they receive only a small part of the investments in the sector. We believe that strengthening market linkages within local supply chains is the best way to help smallholder farmers thrive in Sub-Saharan Africa, connecting large established companies with local small producers. We achieve this by focusing on the financial stability of these larger, local companies by affording them access to international credit markets beyond their national bank lenders; we help them become more investment-ready. Ensuring their financial stability helps them to continue buying from local, small producers. This provides small producers with some stability, which allows them to incorporate more regenerative forms of farming and new techniques to deal with the changing climate while ensuring that the revenues remain stable. This innovation is the result of trial and error and various government-funded research programmes.