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Farming Under Solar: How Agriphotovoltaics Can Transform Rural Livelihoods in India
As India scales up solar energy, a critical question has emerged: Can this transition deliver clean power without displacing farmers from their land? According to Laxmi Sharma, Bidisha Banerjee, Subhodeep Basu and Ashok Gulati at the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, the country's renewable energy expansion has been led by large, ground-mounted solar projects, often located on agricultural land. But while this model has been effective in scaling solar capacity, it has also created a disconnect between the energy and agriculture sectors, while limiting participation among farmers. They explore how agriphotovoltaics (Agri-PV) can address these issues by enabling the cultivation of crops beneath or between panel arrays, and discuss the pros and cons of different Agri-PV operating models.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Energy
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GAFSP Announces $38 Million in Grants to Support Smallholder Farmers Across Africa, Asia, and the Americas
The latest allocation by GAFSP places a strong emphasis on strengthening the capacities and financial sustainability of producer organizations, while scaling up tested innovations for smallholder agriculture.
- Categories
- Agriculture
- Region
- Global
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World Bank Approves $500 Million to Boost Nigeria’s Agriculture, Target One Million Farmers
The project is designed to improve farm productivity, strengthen value chains, and create jobs, while helping to stabilise food supply in Africa’s most populous nation.
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Shell Foundation and Startup Discovery School Launch the West Africa Aggregator Service Platform to Boost the Incomes of Women Smallholder Farmers
It will test service-based, shared and layaway delivery models designed to reduce upfront costs, distribute risk and make proven agricultural technologies viable for women farmers.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Education, Environment
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Three Questions for Five African Businesses: Insights from Sankalp Africa Summit’s ‘Enterprise Showcase’
The recent Sankalp Africa Summit featured an “Enterprise Showcase” where up-and-coming African businesses shared information about their work and missions. NextBillion interviewed five of these entrepreneurs and company representatives, asking each of them three questions: What are the main challenges you’re facing in running your business? What kind of support would help you overcome these challenges? And what’s one thing you wish funders understood about your business needs? Their responses reveal some of the innovative approaches and key issues that are emerging in Africa’s vibrant ecosystem of small and medium-sized enterprises.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Energy, Environment, Social Enterprise, Transportation, WASH
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Press Release: Sistema.Bio Raises $53 Million to Launch FarmCarbon—An Innovative Funding Vehicle Aimed at Expanding Climate Finance for Smallholder Farmers and Accelerating Methane Mitigation
FarmCarbon will facilitate financing for more than 90,000 Sistema.bio digesters on farms worldwide to capture and destroy methane, creating emissions reductions of over 9 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Investing
- Region
- Global
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Uganda’s Zigoti Secures $1 Million Funding From Sahel Capital to Support Smallholder Farmers
Zigoti sources its coffee beans from a network of more than 4,000 smallholder farmers, providing not only a stable market for their harvests but also offering a range of extension services, training programmes, and value-added support aimed at improving crop quality and farmer livelihoods.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Finance
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Western AI Models “Fail Spectacularly” in Farms and Forests Abroad
Big Tech’s AI tools trained on Western data often can’t recognize local crops, forests, or farming conditions without adaptation to local environments, and there is a risk that a focus on profit by big tech firms and large agriculture companies will hurt farmers.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Technology
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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