Deadline: 15-Jun-21
The Water and Energy for Food are inviting applications for East Africa Hub to scale up climate-friendly, energy, and/or water-efficient innovations.
The overall goal is to increase the sustainability of agricultural food value chains and address environmental and climate resilience in developing countries and emerging markets – with a particular focus on the poor and women.
Innovations may include technologies (such as weather forecast apps, solar cooling technologies, hydroponic farming approaches), business and finance models (such as pay-as-you-go models for solar pumping, leasing models for e-motorbikes in rural areas), and new modes of cooperation (e.g. sharing economy model, which favours access to technologies and services over ownership).
Objectives
The objectives of the hub include:
- Supporting the distribution of innovations (solar technologies, apps, e-mobility, etc.)
- Strengthening entrepreneurial capacities
- Informing end-users and multipliers about innovations
- Improving access to financing for innovators and end-users
- Improving political conditions for innovations
- Accelerating the exchange of experiences on the local, regional and global level
Benefits
- Be part of the accelerator first cohort in East Africa: At least 15 enterprises from across 7countries will be shortlisted to be part of the first regional programme. Supports will be delivered over a 15 to 18-month period.
- The program will provide business advisory and access to finance support of between €50,000 to €500,000 to:
- Expand your business to other geographies, products, or services,
- Unlock investments for your business to scale, and
- Increase your business’s annual turnover.
- Financing opportunities: Select enterprises may qualify for results-based financing opportunities to help achieve scaling goals.
Eligibility Criteria
- WE4F is looking for innovative Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) who are addressing the water-energy-food nexus in East Africa. The enterprises must offer solutions that increase sustainable food production, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and / or reduce water and energy intensity of the food chain, while increasing income for smallholder farmers, women and youth. The enterprises should also meet the following minimum criteria:
- Geography: Legally incorporated as a for-profit company in at least one of these focus countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Malawi, or Somalia.
- Age: Businesses must be operational for a minimum of 18 months in at least one of the focus countries
- Size: They are looking for established enterprises with annual revenue of €50,000 to €500,000 equivalent – not at pilot or prototype stages. Applicants should also have a well-established team of between 5 to 200 employees.
- Ambition: Applicants must have an established current customer base with ambitions to scale to new geographies, products, customer segments, and/or increase annual turnover. They should be seeking debt, equity, or blended finance investments to scale the business.
- Impact: The best candidates will demonstrate direct/indirect positive impact to the smallholder farmers, the environment, women, and youth.
- Please Note:
- The programme specifically encourages applications from women-owned / women-led enterprises with a set gender quota of 30% of enterprises in the portfolio being women-owned or being/ becoming women-led within the coming two years.
- Government entities, non-profit organizations, academic and research institutions, and individuals are not eligible to apply.
For more information, visit https://eastafrica.we4f.org/
