Grant: Soil Health Program for Farm Households in Africa

An instructor trains farmers in seed production field management, Uganda.

About the Grantee:
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) is an African-led partnership formed in 2006. Its mission: to help millions of small farmers lift themselves and their families out of poverty and hunger.

Grant Amount: $164.5 million

Grant Term: December 2007—December 2013

Grant Location: Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia

Partners:The Rockefeller Foundation is a funding partner.

This grant includes a plan for third-party evaluation.

Grantee: The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA)

The soils of sub-Saharan Africa are the most degraded in the world. Farmers in the region use about 10 times less fertilizer than farmers elsewhere. Together, these factors contribute to crop yields that are two to five times lower than the global average.

Farmers can increase their yields and, therefore, their incomes if they have access to fertilizer and the training they need to use it efficiently and sustainably. In particular, farmers need to know their options for regenerating soil fertility, techniques known collectively as Integrated Soil Fertility Management (ISFM).

This grant supports AGRA’s work with farmers throughout sub-Saharan Africa on advanced soil management methods and with policymakers to create incentives for better soil management. This builds on a major grant to AGRA in 2007 that is already helping develop and distribute quality seeds for African small farmers on a large scale.

The grant will also help AGRA build the fertilizer supply chain to increase farmers' access to fertilizer and other inputs. The goal is to help 4.1 million farm households increase their yields by 50 to 100 percent.