Study on the funding mechanisms for responsible innovation in agrifood systems in Africa

Funding mechanisms for responsible innovation to help transform agrifood systems in Africa: Making options for DeSIRA projects explicit.

The DeSIRA initiative brings together 45 research and development projects aimed at fostering an inclusive, sustainable, and climate-adaptive transformation of rural areas and agri-food systems, by linking agricultural innovation with research and education to achieve large-scale development impacts.
HORUS has been commissioned to support DeSIRA projects in identifying financing mechanisms to scale up their innovations and to capitalize on lessons learned.
The services provided by HORUS include the following activities:

• Phase 1: A structured mapping of financing mechanisms accessible to stakeholders across the African continent to support the scaling up of innovation, based on a desk review;
• Phase 2: Support to 12 projects in identifying and articulating their financing needs for scaling up innovations, along with enhanced support to 4 of them in developing a financing strategy;
• Phase 3: Knowledge capitalization through (i) a practical methodological guide for project promoters to support the development of financing strategies for scaling innovations, and (ii) a brief synthesizing lessons learned and providing recommendations for financing the scaling of innovations, targeting both project promoters and donors.