TrustAfrica and the Agroecology Fund have announced a new partnership to launch Regional Agroecology Funds in West and Eastern Africa to provide climate and hunger solutions.
The fund is coming over reports that Africa’s soils have been weakened by overuse of chemical inputs and failed Green Revolution policies.
The Regional Agroecology Funds is aimed at financing and learning tools to support agroecology networks and organizations across the two regions.
The funds will be co-managed by TrustAfrica and the Agroecology Fund.
A statement by the media office of TrustAfrica explained that the Funds will; offer donors a simple way to fund grassroots organisations, networks, and emerging enterprises that are critical to scaling agroecology up and out across Africa; ensure that organisations representing indigenous peoples, women, and youth receive the support they need to advance agroecology and uphold their rights.
Also, the Funds would support grantee organisations in monitoring their progress against sought outcomes; contribute to regional learning, and to knowledge generation and exchanges, to deepen grassroots evidence for agroecology, and to adjust and improve strategies for scaling up agroecology.
Speaking on the partnership, Dr. Ebrima Sall, Executive Director of Trust Africa, said that they have “a strong record of seeding and nurturing new, leading organizations, voices and networks and anchoring collaborative processes and movement building to find solutions to critical questions that can advance a progressive continental development agenda. Agroecology is one such critical solution.”
Also, Tabara Ndiaye, Agroecology Fund African Regional Funds Coordinator, stated that, “The African agroecology movement is so dynamic and creative. We are thrilled to team up with TrustAfrica to provide support to a movement that lies at the heart of a sustainable and equitable future for Africa.”
The partnership will be using a unique participatory philanthropic model that relies on guidance from grassroots African advisors, experts in the field and embedded in agroecology movements, the funds will provide resources to highly effective practitioners, scientists, and movement builders working across the continent to achieve equitable and sustainable food systems.
The core business of the Funds is to support an ecosystem of collaborating African grassroots organizations and networks to transform food systems through agroecology.
The Funds have been capitalized by philanthropic organizations both large and small, from the Ikea Foundation to the 11th Hour Project.
With agroecology increasingly embraced as a critical solution to multiple challenges that Africa is facing, the funds are expected to grow quickly.
