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Apply Now: $1.5 Million Smart Agriculture Grants from Gates Foundation

By Wayan Vota on February 1, 2021

gates foundation grant

Smallholder farmers suffer from fundamental challenges to improving their own food security and their communities nutritional resilience. They face low agriculture productivity driven by multiple factors:

  • Incomplete information and minimal services
  • Climate change, weather variability and pest/disease outbreaks
  • Few tailored financial and insurance products
  • Lack of access to and choice of market and offtake options
  • Low language and digital literacy
  • High relative cost of services and devices
  • Gender gaps and a growing digital divide

Gates Foundation Smart Farming Grand Challenge

The Smart Farming Innovations for Small-scale Producers Grand Challenge for Development from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation seeks innovative digital solutions with potential to drive positive impact for smallholder farmer entrepreneurs. The agritech solutions delivered through bundled farmer services should be enabled by scalable digital and data platforms.

Sign Up Now for More AgriTech Grants!

ICT4Ag solutions should address one or more challenges facing small scale crop and livestock producer entrepreneurs in one or more areas of:

  • Agricultural advisory
  • Farm management decision support
  • Input supply
  • Finance
  • Insurance
  • Market access and linkages

These grants are focused on ICTforAg solutions in Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Rwanda, Ghana, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Malawi, Zambia, Mozambique, Nigeria, India, and Bangladesh. There are two grant funding opportunists – Seed Grants and Scale-Up Grants. Applicants can only apply for one of these grant types.

USD 250,000 Seed Grants

Seed Grants are for Smart Farming solutions that can demonstrate potential in meeting the following criteria within 12 months:

  • Leveraging digital technology innovations with the potential to scale,
  • Show potential to improve incomes, productivity and ability to adapt to climate change;
  • Address barriers to scaled adoption of digital services: access, affordability, language and digital literacy.
  • Have potential to be bundled with multiple farmer-facing services into an integrated solution;
  • Are enabled by robust digital and data technology platforms and services;

USD 1,500,000 Scale-Up Grants

Scale Up Grants are for Smart Farming Solutions with demonstrated evidence of positive impact within 24 months. In addition to Seed Grant criteria, Scale-Up Grants must also:

  • Leverage digital technology innovations with demonstrated readiness to scale and proven ability to bundle with other services;
  • Be a scalable platform with sustainable bundled service delivery models;
  • Demonstrate value capture by farmers or other value chain actors over the long term.

Apply Now! Deadline is February 25, 2021

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Written by
Wayan Vota co-founded ICTworks. He also co-founded Technology Salon, MERL Tech, ICTforAg, ICT4Djobs, ICT4Drinks, JadedAid, Kurante, OLPC News and a few other things. Opinions expressed here are his own and do not reflect the position of his employer, any of its entities, or any ICTWorks sponsor.
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14 Comments to “Apply Now: $1.5 Million Smart Agriculture Grants from Gates Foundation”

  1. I like this post as it will enrich our agricultural activities in our country

  2. I am writing on behalf of TEYODEN TEYODEN stands for Temeke Youth Development Network. It was established as an outcome of out of school youth programme that was funded by UNICEF( in 19 Districts in Tanzania Temeke being one of them) and implemented by Temeke Municipal Council in 2001. TEYODEN was REGISTERED as Non-Government Organization in 2007.TEYODEN coordinates Youth activities in 30 youth centers( 1 in each Ward in Temeke Municipality) and has about 10 youth led NGOS,20 CBOs and 1072 individual members.

    Our Vision:- To be the leading youth network in Tanzania which facilitates youh to be responsible in behavior changes and play significant role in social and economical activities.

    Our Mission:-To be a ward youth centers,youth led NGO`s and Youth led CBOs strategic leader,supervisor and capacity builder.

    The youth for change programme

    It is documented in Tanzania National youth policy 2007 and other National policies that youth make 65% of National population and 68% of the national manpower,but still youth struggles with personal,social and economical challenges.

    Currently the Network is conducting programme to increase participation and involvement of youth towards life improvements,especially youth to become self improved,self employed and self developed against poverty,ignorance and diseases through lifeskills training,entrepreneurship education.The Network deals with cross cutting issues of such as health matters,drug abuse prevention activities,environment conservation and HIV/Aids prevention campaigning since youth are among of group which is most affected by.

    Therefore the goal for the programme is atleast to reach 40% of the youth in 3 years to have been transformed their mindset and become proactive in executing the life basic learning outcomes that fosters them to develop creative mind of critical thinking and life goals setting inorder that may be able seeing existing opportunities and utilize them for their lives betterment and sustainability while having the good health.

    The vision is wide but the resources are quite limited.Therefore the Network is seeking for the possible collaboration from your office to make youth`s ideal dreams become real and as well as time to time TEYODEN`s mission being accomplished.

  3. SILAS DANG says:

    Good day and well wishes to you for the great work you are doing to salvage lives of the imporverished.
    I very much interested to apply for Gates Foundation Smart Farming Grand Challenge
    Great if you guide me further.
    Thanks
    Silas Dang

  4. Very proud to be associated with your organization

  5. Joshua Oloo says:

    This is a very good initiative that will benefit many farmers to scale up their farming activities and productivity. It’s my wish to benefit from this initiative since I have very strong interests in agriculture and funding is a real challenge that is hindering better results in this noble business.

  6. pradip udar says:

    We are living in rural India we are running ngo for rural people and school children so we realy need grand
    Please contact us
    Trimurti bahuddeshiya pratistan chambhurdi Shrigonda Ahmednagar maharashtra India 413703
    [email protected]
    Mo.9518738808

  7. Our NGO is working in a remote area in Nsanje District in Malawi we have more than 90 people we work with and as an Ngo the board of directors we manage to buy one Petrol engine water pump through little contributions
    We are doing Small farmer irrigation these poeple are vulnerable and they use Shire River for their irrigation some times they carry water on their head using 25 litres pail
    We need help from the well wishers to come to us in older to assist these people to archive their plans they want to have bumper cultivation
    Visit our website https://lowershireambassodors. co.za

  8. Mary Yuyi says:

    This programme sounds very good it has come at a time when we are planning to work with farmers,do an outgrower system to help the communities have something to sustain their families. We need to grow more food so that we feed the nation’s in Africa and abroad. We are teaching farmers on modern techniques on farming and selling seed,we are specialised in garlic,ginger and turmeric being high value crops and their nutritional and medicinal benefits.

  9. lowershire ambassodors is desperate looking for partners to work with..
    All our efforts of helping the farmers are sourced from the founding members and fundraising.

    We are ready to work and deliver the success

  10. Lower shire Ambassodors
    Mary Yayi
    We are looking forward from you and we promise to invite you in our website and also in our email adress.
    In short we can say that LOWERSHIRE AMBASSDDOR (LSA) is a registered Local ngo by the government of Malawi under the registerar general. And also is a member of the mother body ambuleller of all ngo CONGOMA And also member of Malawi Government NGO board and also in our district of Nsanje we are the member of Civil Society Organazation CSO
    Now LSA has got 7 board of directors and we do Monthly contributions every month and the money we get from the contributions are very few and because of this we agree to make the pledge to reach our goal and we dont have any donor but we try to make other charity work in our catchment area like to empower womens to saving their money through VSL through their contributions and protect the women from other bad taboos and also we encourage 50 50 gender campagn also we help children to go to school and also provide mask for those who needy it we do this through our monthly contributions . But our main goal.is food security thats why we try to donate a water pump because these community are usind Shire River for their farming and because of their interest of this we saw them carring water from 25 litre backets in their head for watering their seeds thats why we do this in order to make these community to have enough food and also enough money when they go to market to sell their crops
    But we need assistance from well wishers to provide us with resources like desil water pums or sollar watetpumps inorder to reach the goal . One water pump is not enough
    Find us by using this email adresses [email protected]
    [email protected]

  11. Domician Charles says:

    Good idea, worth attempting

  12. Please visit our website
    https://lowershireambassodors.co.za/
    And see who we are but the fact is we need some donors to work or to assist us in order to reach our goal
    Dont forget that we are working in the remote area with Vunerable people

  13. Segun Emmanuel ogunmola says:

    Highly interested to get Grant to assist the unemployed ,less priviledged, and children, women,men, and youth generally so that they can be self sustained. This is my vision to reduce poverty in Nigeria and globally , to make positive impact in this generation & next generation. To be an employer of labour’s. Thanks. Yours faithfully,
    Segun Emmanuel ogunmola, 3095763333 first bank plc, 0231512984 gtb, credit my account +2347035777285

  14. Nyerembe Munasa says:

    I sent in time our project concept note but it was not delivered!