According to the World Economic Forum, small and medium-sized enterprises are vital to Africa’s economy and are responsible for more than 80 percent of the continent’s jobs and 50 percent of its gross domestic product.
Agri-SMEs play an even more important role, as they play a crucial role in developing more inclusive and sustainable food systems because they are responsible for the entire value chain.
This sector is crucial in providing employment and income opportunities for young women and men. Although the number of agricultural SMEs in Africa has continued to grow over the years, their business development, potential and sustainability have been constrained by persistent financial, political and innovation challenges that have hindered their growth and full potential.
Over the years, most efforts to improve the sector’s performance and competitiveness have focused on the challenges faced by SMEs in accessing flexible and affordable financing to enable them to expand and expand.
However, the sector still faces other significant non-financial challenges that have hindered the growth of agricultural SMEs such as weak innovation strategies, access to an enabling business environment, access to markets, access to human capital, and access to skills and capacity development. .
Due to the lack of access to new technology and lack of information about new agricultural technology, the majority of SMEs still use outdated methods to carry out their agricultural activities, leading to poor productivity and lack of scalability.
Both the government and the private sector need to work together to address these challenges that have hindered the growth of the sector in a profound way, from an innovation perspective, taking into account the social, economic, cultural and environmental characteristics in which SMEs operate. in.
Interventions should strengthen linkages between learning and research institutions, with a focus on agriculture in order to develop technology and transfer it to SMEs, to create awareness about skills certification and development, and market opportunities.
Innovation in this sector will seek to enhance the competitiveness, productivity and sustainability of SMEs in supporting the economy and ultimately creating job opportunities for youth.
The MasterCard Foundation Resilience and Prosperity Fund will contribute to resolving some of the challenges faced by agricultural SMEs through several interventions such as providing direct financial support through the Challenge Fund intervention, providing investor support to enable agricultural SMEs to attract potential investors and providing capacity building through the assistance intervention. Artistic.
The Fund targets SMEs that have innovative and scalable business models and have great potential to create employment opportunities for young people, especially young women, young people with disabilities and refugee youth.
Selected SMEs will receive grants ranging from $500,000 to $2.5 million, disbursed over three years, and based on applicants’ stage of development, scalability and business model.
Additional support for successful applicants will include tailored technical assistance in line with the Fund’s objectives over the three-year period.
SMEs operating in Kenya, Benin, Burundi, Botswana, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia are encouraged to apply to the Fund and can visit www.frp.org for more information.
The writer is the MasterCard Foundation Fund for Resilient Communications and Prosperity and leads meetings at KPMG East Africa