Reshaping Kenyan Agriculture for Dignified Livelihoods

Reshaping Kenyan Agriculture for Dignified Livelihoods is sponsored by Mastercard Foundation (in partnership with One Acre Fund). This four-year partnership (2023-2026) between the Mastercard Foundation and One Acre Fund provides comprehensive support to young people in Kenya to shift their mindsets towards agriculture, increase agricultural productivity, and access appropriate finance and profitable marke…

Reshaping Kenyan Agriculture for | Mastercard Foundation Share on X (opens in a new tab) One Acre Fund is an agricultural service provider that supports Africa’s smallholder farmers in building resilient communities. More than 50 million families in Sub-Saharan Africa earn a living from small farms, which produce 80 percent of the continent’s food. But harvests still lag far behind the rest of the world.

One Acre Fund supplies the financing and training these farmers need to grow out of hunger and build lasting pathways to prosperity. For more information visit: oneacrefund.

org Through this four-year partnership (2023-2026) with the Mastercard Foundation, One Acre Fund provides comprehensive support to young people to shift their mindsets towards agriculture, increase agricultural productivity, and access appropriate finance and profitable markets. This is designed to increase income and improve lives for young people, their families, and their communities.

The program seeks to transform young smallholder farmers from subsistence to commercial-oriented production by introducing them to high-value crops such as macadamia, avocado, French beans, and groundnuts and engaging with anchor market partners for guaranteed local and export markets.

Young people entering the program are supported with entrepreneurship training and connected to established businesses that provide them with high-quality agricultural inputs (e.g. seeds, fertilizers, etc.), equipment, value addition of their produce, and off-takers/market for their produce.

Young people can, therefore, find opportunities for work through: Micro-entrepreneurship (tractor operators, booking agents, equipment leasing agents, etc.). Partnerships with Hello Tractor and KickStart International are enabling this. Production of high-value crops such as macadamia, avocado, French beans, and groundnuts.

Aggregation as field and aggregation agents for produce – to promote and distribute diverse high-value crops. Appropriate financing is also provided via a digitally enabled credit-building program to support the participants with capital. Other aspects of the program include in-field training through peer-to-peer mentorship, experiential learning and digital modules.

This program complements One Acre Fund’s ‘Tupande’ multi-channel model through a large and growing duka (retail shop) network and online farmer platform. Through this program, One Acre Fund is significantly increasing the proportion of young people served in its network.

The program is open to young women and men (aged 18-35 years) with a passion for agriculture and success in these six regions: Nyanza, Rift, Coast, Mount Kenya, Lower Western and Upper Western. Young women are strongly encouraged to apply.