Rome: The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Swiss Federal Government have announced the winners of the 2021 edition of the International Innovation Prize for Sustainable Food Systems, a joint initiative designed to encourage and celebrate innovation and entrepreneurs who successfully implement remarkable projects in the agricultural sector.

The awards were announced in a virtual ceremony with the participation of FAO Director General QU Dongyu and Christian Hofer, Director General of the Swiss Federal Office for Agriculture. The ceremony took place on the first day of the flagship event (October 1-5, 2021) of the World Food Forum – a youth-led movement and network to transform agrifood systems.

The main award for Digitization and Innovation for Sustainable Food Systems goes to innovations that impact at more than one level of the supply chain and strengthen the link between farmers and consumers. A second prize is also awarded for innovations that empower young people in agriculture and food systems. The prize for each prize is $ 30,000, enabling winners to take their business to the next level.

This year’s award for Digitization and Innovation for Sustainable Food Systems went to Ifarm360, a start-up that enables investors to crowdfund Kenya’s smallholder farmers. In addition to access to finance, Ifarm360 offers small farmers advice and crop supervision, as well as agricultural inputs and equipment such as solar irrigation kits. Ifarm360 connects small farmers, collective investors and buyers, creating a win-win business model.

Special mention was given to Enveritas for using digital technology and innovation to conduct a sustainability audit of unorganized and underserved small coffee farmers around the world.

The Innovations that Empower Youth in Agriculture and Food Systems Award was split this year between two projects, both of which received equally high rankings from the selection committee.

Access Agriculture AISBL was recognized for enabling young people, individually or in teams, to use solar technology to show farmer-to-farmer training videos in local languages ​​in remote villages without electricity, internet access and with weak mobile signal. Access Agriculture works with local communities in Southern countries, while improving the environment using agroecological principles.

Access Agriculture shared the award with Bountifield International, which offers young people in rural areas new opportunities as postharvest technology entrepreneurs offering fee-for-service payments to farmers to process, store and sell their crops. Bountifield’s business in a box model provides them with the technology, access to finance and information they need to generate added value in agribusiness, reduce food loss and increase growth in the industry. all of rural Africa.

FAO Director-General Qu Dongyu congratulated the winners, adding that the award “highlights the importance of innovation and youth as key drivers of agrifood systems transformation. FAO works to engage and empower young people to transform our agrifood systems. “

“I would like to express my gratitude to the Swiss government for the effective partnership which has led to this positive result. It also affirms the value of our common goal – to encourage breakthrough solutions through innovative approaches and people, ”he said.

Christian Hofer, Director General of the Federal Office for Agriculture, said that the “Swiss-FAO International Innovation Prize aims to honor already existing projects that have proven to be successful and have the potential to expand. or extend to other parts of the systems power supply. This type of support is important because more innovative projects that work well are needed to achieve transformation of food systems. “

“I am convinced that transformative change is only possible if it engages young people and harnesses the potential of digitization in the agriculture and food sector,” he said.

FAO and the Swiss Federal Government first launched the awards in 2018, to encourage innovation by publicly recognizing best practices in sustainable food and agriculture. Each year, individuals, private companies and institutions are invited to submit an application for an innovation that contributes to Sustainable Development Goal 1, No Hunger. This year, the awards were part of the flagship event of the World Food Forum, celebrating youth-led actions and raising awareness, encouraging commitment and mobilizing resources for food systems transformation. To learn more about the winners and previous editions of the awards, click here.