January 25, 2008
Gates Foundation Unveils $306-Million in Agricultural Grants
By Nicole Wallace
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation today announced six grants totaling $306-million for programs designed to increase agricultural productivity and income for small-scale farmers in Africa and Asia.
The projects seek to improve farming soil, develop more robust varieties of rice, increase access to irrigation, and help farmers get their crops to market.
“If we are serious about ending extreme hunger and poverty around the world, we must be serious about transforming agriculture for small farmers — most of whom are women,” Bill Gates said when he announced the new grants at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
“These investments — from improving the quality of seeds, to developing healthier soil, to creating new markets — will pay off not only in children fed and lives saved. They can have a dramatic impact on poverty reduction as families generate additional income and improve their lives.”
The new grants double the amount of money that the Gates Foundation has awarded since the start of its agriculture grant-making program in 2006. The foundation says its spending on agriculture grants will reach $900-million by the end of this year
The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, will receive $164.5-million over five years for a program designed to improve soil health in 14 African countries. The alliance was founded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, which will contribute an additional $25-million for the soil project.
In a speech to the World Economic Forum yesterday, Mr. Gates called for a new “creative capitalism” to harness the power of business to aid the world’s poor.
“Giving money away is a good way to change lives, but it is not a sustainable way to change the world,” he said.
That market-based approach is evident in several of the agriculture grants announced today.
The foundation awarded a four-year $42.8-million grant to Heifer
International to help small-scale dairy farmers in Kenya, Rwanda, and Uganda sell their milk in the formal dairy-processing sector, in part by building “chilling stations,” intermediate collection points where the milk can be held before going to the processor.
A four-year $5.25-million grant to CARE will aid dairy farmers in
Bangladesh.
TechnoServe, an American group that works to fight rural poverty around the world, will use a four-year $46.9-million grant to expand its efforts to help coffee farmers in East Africa adopt growing and processing techniques that will allow them to sell their crops for a higher price on the premium coffee market.
The organization works with farmers’ groups to help them understand the steps they need to take to sell to the higher-paying coffee market and to buy processing equipment. The 10,000 farmers that TechnoServe has worked with in Tanzania have seen their household incomes double.
Because the program helps farmers create businesses that are taking advantage of a market opportunity, the benefits continue even after TechnoServe stops working with the groups, says Bruce McNamer, the organization’s chief executive officer.
“You don’t have to keep putting donor money into this,” he says. “Once those businesses are up and running, once you’ve had that catalyzing effect, this becomes almost by definition self-sustaining.”
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I think Bill Gates foundation has done well for giving such huge sum of money to support Farming in Asia and Africa.This will increase AGRO-PRODUCTIVITY.They need to think on those suffering children.I have a heart to build homes for needy children in GHANA,and I need sponsorship.I hope just one philanthropist can help.My mailing address is;REV.JAMES NII COMMEY,P.O.BOX KF 1428,KOFORIDUA—E/R.GHANA.e-mail:jAMESNIICOMMEY@YAHOO.COM
— REV.JAMES NII COMMEY Jan 25, 04:07 PM #
Yes, increasing agro-productivity means too, having overview about peasant household and land tenure
— Radison Jan 27, 08:51 PM #
In 1989 I designed farms underground in which we beamed the sunlight underground and magnified it 10,000 times using freznel lenses. I approached the department of agriculture Puerto Rico and after a year of proposals and business plans the PR department of agriculture in meetings told PERI Farms we would receive a 17.5 million dollar grant once we retained the land built roads to the farms installed electric and water to the farms. In the meantime they would analyze the viability of the farms. The farms are both hydroponic and aeroponic. The beauty of underground farms is that we can completely control the environment. We control Co2 air temps, humidity and temperatures. Our plants grow faster and bigger due to the fiber optics, they grow between 21 and 28 inches a day. We can also grow grasses for cattle at amazing rates. Another point is that once you are underground (3 feet or more) it is 60 degrees F everyday. each growing cell is independent of the other so that if a disease enters one cell you can sterilize one cell without having an effect on the others. There is no growing cycle so you grow all year round. Production is 5 times that of being above ground. Once you put water into the system we retain 90% of the water per year. We can make a desert or make it snow. In the end the government canceled the grants because it would destroy the world economy in 2 years (these were their words written and read to me by the PR secretary of agriculture. I put in my Biz plan I could feed all of Ethiopia on a 250 acre farm. What was written and read back to me was the following. “Policy is made by food and fuel, they are not a democracy at this time, so we do not want you to go around feeding them. Your farms would destroy the world economy and we are canceling your grants”.
In a conversation with the secretary he stated if the farms came about, there would not be any importation or exportation taxes, no more dock workers, no more truckers. What would we do with all these people? Imagine if Alaska could grow strawberries in February. The farms were deemed to dangerous. I also shared information with the university of Puerto Rico for mushroom farming who’s grants were about to be canceled (proffessor Manugi). The secretary stated it was ok, because it was for education! Mr. Gates if you really wish to feed those in Africa contact me. We can feed Africa in 3 years, with this system. I would like you to contact me, so that I know my time is not waisted. Thank you for your time and consideration. I gave up a Job working for a major utility company in New York to make this a reality. That was 20 years ago.
— Destino Rivera Jan 30, 12:40 PM #