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Biochar Industrial Group To Scale Biochar-As-A-Service With New $1.5 Million Funding
The funding will enable the company to grow its biochar-as-a-service model, through which it helps food processing factories convert waste into CO2 removal solutions.
- Categories
- Agriculture, WASH
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Can India Transition to Solar Without Leaving Farmers Behind? Lessons from Rajasthan’s First Farmer-Owned Agri-PV Pilot
Earlier this year, Rajasthan’s first farmer-owned Agri-PV plant was inaugurated under the Indian government’s PM-KUSUM program. As Laxmi Sharma and Subhodeep Basu at the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) explain, Agri-PV involves installing elevated, ground-mounted PV panels so farmers can generate electricity and additional income while cultivating the land underneath. They share learnings from ICRIER's work supporting the early implementation of this model in India, where the key challenges have involved not technical design and engineering questions, but the difficulties of coordinating people, processes and institutions — and establishing and maintaining farmer trust.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Energy, Environment
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SunCulture Closes $10 Million Solar Irrigation Securitisation
"The transaction will allow SunCulture to recycle capital tied up in customer receivables and expand solar irrigation financing."
- Categories
- Agriculture, Energy, Environment, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Twiga Foods Enters Administration After Years of Financial Pressure
"Twiga’s fall is particularly notable because of how much money and attention it attracted during its growth years."
- Categories
- Agriculture, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Five35 Ventures Completes 1st Portfolio Exit, Generates 3.5x Return From Complete Farmer Investment
The Africa Growth Fund is a US$200 million fund-of-funds designed to strengthen African-led, women-led investment vehicles and enable them to invest in businesses with the potential to contribute to inclusive growth and job creation.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Absolute Takes Its AI-Led Biological Agriculture Platform INERA to Africa, Begins Commercial Operations in Kenya
The move comes as Africa emerges as one of the world’s most consequential agricultural growth markets.
- Categories
- Agriculture
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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IFC Partners with Absa Bank Ghana and Complete Farmer to Expand Agricultural Finance in Ghana
Supported by the Private Sector Window of the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program (GAFSP), the facility will finance purchases of traceable cocoa from farmers across Ghana. It will also support more sustainable farming practices aligned with the Paris Agreement on climate change.
- Categories
- Agriculture
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Missing the Exit: The Growing Need for New Exit Pathways in Agriculture Investing
Exits make the wheel of impact investing go around, enabling companies to sustain and grow their operations, while also allowing investors to recycle returned capital into other impactful solutions. But as Coco Lim at Acumen explains, right now that wheel is not turning — particularly in agriculture, which has the lowest ratio of exits to deals of any sector in Africa. She argues that this situation puts impact investors at a crossroads: They can stay the course and hope that big exits are around the corner, or they can build the necessary exit pathways themselves. She discusses the challenges of achieving exits in smallholder-focused agriculture, highlighting the limitations of current investing models and exploring some exit strategies that offer untapped opportunities for impact investors and businesses.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Investing
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