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The Straightest Path to Social Impact: The Power of Focusing on Farmers
After speaking to hundreds of low-income farmers in Nepal, India and Myanmar, Aditi Seshadri learned some basic truths about the challenges they face, the importance of their work - and the outsize value of interventions aimed at supporting them. She explores the reasons why a focus on farmers can maximize a social enterprise's impact.
- Categories
- Agriculture
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Blockchain for Agriculture: Improving Supply Chain Efficiency and Access to Finance for Smallholder Farmers
Though blockchain applications in agriculture are still in early stages, they have intriguing potential that merits increased investment and exploration, says Nikki Brand. She discusses several innovative uses of the technology across the agriculture supply chain, and highlights new Stanford University research on the organizations and initiatives that are leveraging blockchain to drive social impact.
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- Agriculture, Technology
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Sustainable crop certification could help world’s poorest farmers
Sustainable crop certification schemes could be missing the poorest farmers who are most in need of their benefits, according to a new Atlas Award-winning paper in Biological Conservation. In their study, a team of researchers from the UK and the US mapped one million of the world's commodity crops, including banana, cocoa, coffee, and tea, showing where they are certified. They suggest that if schemes developed stronger standards and targeted poor areas more effectively, they could make a bigger impact - if they can also increase consumer demand for certified products.
- Categories
- Agriculture
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Better Data for Better Products: New Online Resource Aims to Close the $200 Billion Smallholder Finance Gap
The US $200 billion gap in farmer finance is a tremendous opportunity – but it's one that financial service providers are missing, due to the lack of transparent and reliable data. That's why One Acre Fund and MIX, with support from the Mastercard Foundation's RAF Learning Lab, launched the Smallholder Finance Product Explorer. A May 8 webinar will show industry actors how to use some of these new online tools to reach the 450 million smallholders in need of financing.
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- Agriculture, Investing
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Using big data to link poor farmers to finance
The global growth of microfinance banks has created new opportunities for financial inclusion, with outstanding lending of $100 billion to around 200 million clients. Yet the majority of lending from microfinance institutions has been to urban populations and not to the rural poor or small farmers.
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- Agriculture, Finance
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Press release: Africa’s Biggest Farmer Collective to Help 100,000 in Niger Delta as Tata and John Deere Sign Alluvial Initiative
Tractor maker John Deere and India’s biggest conglomerate, Tata Group, have agreed a groundbreaking initiative to provide machinery to as many as 100,000 smallholder farmers in the troubled Niger Delta region.
- Source
- Press release
- Categories
- Agriculture
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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For Solar Irrigation to Grow, the Pump Needs to be Innovative – So Does the Warranty
Helen Davies at Futurepump writes that the startup has developed a cost-effective, solar-based pump to irrigate crops that is simple to use and maintain, and designed specifically with small rural farms in mind. The firm has already sold 4,000 units and is distributing in 11 African and Asian countries. But beyond the technology, an equally important innovation is the company's five-year warranty on the product, which Davies says is an industry first. She makes the case that solar device makers operating in low-income markets need to stand behind their products with warrantees and service, if customers are going to trust the technology and the manufacturers.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Energy, Technology
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Digitizing the Base of the Pyramid: The Impact of Bringing Digital Finance to Last-Mile Farmers
Only 5 percent of Rwanda’s dairy farmers have access to credit, due in part to their lack of proof of income and inability to build a financial history. That’s why N-Frnds, a cloud-based software platform, partnered with the Rwandan government to digitize the milk collection process. Alyssa Mesich of N-Frnds recounts how the partnership has impacted milk production and boosted financial inclusion – results that suggest the vast potential impact of digitizing value chain-based financial services for last-mile farmers globally.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Finance, Technology