This year’s World Food Day theme, “Innovate today. Nourish tomorrow,” speaks to one of Africa’s biggest opportunities: connecting the people who produce the continent’s food with access to the technologies, finance, climate-resilient infrastructure and markets that allow them to produce more and earn more.
Sometimes that looks like a woman farmer getting access to climate-smart seed varieties and fertilisers that allow her to grow more food, in more arid places. Sometimes it looks like a women’s farming cooperative learning how to control pests and improve soil on a steep hillside. Or a woman building a poultry business, generating income that helps keep her children in school rather than working in a cobalt mine. It is a woman entrepreneur who built an app that uses AI to transform farmer’s herds into access to finance.
These are changes taking place in the lives and businesses of African women, and they are strengthening Africa’s food security.
The United Nations has designated 2026 the International Year of the Woman Farmer. That recognition matters because women have been central to African agriculture for thousands of years. Women make up nearly half of Africa’s agrifood workforce—about 49% region‑wide and 76% of all working women in sub‑Saharan Africa making it the largest employer of women on the continent.
The stories of women benefitting from African Development Bank Group programs and initiatives show what can be achieved when investments in the Bank’s Feed Africa Strategy reaches them.
Bank program beneficiary and groundnut farmer Naba Keita said increased earnings earned her recognition among women leaders in her village
Take Naba Keita, a groundnut farmer in Mali, who has seen her yields and earnings rise through a mobile savings model supported through the Bank’s Agri-food Small and Medium Enterprise Catalytic Financing Mechanism. Keita is one of more than 162,500 women in Mali, Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire who benefited from this myAgro (link is external) digital platform. Keita says additional income strengthened her contribution to household expenses and earned her recognition among women leaders in her village. Her story shows how access to climate-resilient inputs, training and a way to pay for them gradually can improve both farm production and a woman’s economic standing.
Women are innovating across agricultural value chains as well.
Engineer Jenny Ambukiyenyi Onya, supported by the Bank’s Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA), used AI innovation to unlock financing for rural livestock farmers. Her app creates a digital identity for livestock, providing farmers with a reliable way to count and value their herds. The digital inventory serves as proof of ownership. Her solution for creating collateral gives financial institutions the confidence to approve loans.
In Nigeria, agripreneur Erisa Danlani switched from planting maize to wheat – and saw her harvest profits rise 200% through the Nigeria Agriculture Growth Scheme-Agro Pocket programme, part of the Bank’s $1.5 billion Africa Emergency Food Production Facility. In her story, we learn how the innovative programme is promoting climate-resilient crops.
On the slopes of Kibuka in Tanzania, Molissia Molissia Mbiki and the women of the Kibuka Women’s Cooperative have faced pests, low yields and few customers. Bank facilitated training in crop management, soil improvement and pest control, together with rehabilitation of a local market, has helped improve production, sales and access to regional clients.
Bank Director Njuki (l) with UN Women Cote d’Ivoire Country Representative Adjaratout Fatou Ndiaye (r) – partnership between the organizations is encouraging digital markets to “Buy From Women”
In Côte d’Ivoire, AFAWA support, in partnership with UN Women, is helping more than 21,000 women in 322 women-led staple-food cooperatives strengthen their agricultural, financial and business skills and improve access to digital markets. Their story demonstrates what becomes possible when women farmers have the tools, finance and market access to grow their businesses.
In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the connection between agricultural livelihoods and children’s futures is especially clear. In communities affected by child labour in cobalt mining, a Bank-supported programme is helping families develop alternative sources of income, including poultry farming, so parents have more options than sending their children into dangerous mines. More than 10,500 young parents, more than half of them women, have received support to move into agribusiness activities.
As climate change continues to hit women farmers hard, water is equally important. In Mauritania, the National Integrated Rural Water Sector Project supports small-scale irrigation to strengthen income-generating activities for women and young people in agriculture. Better access to water reduces the time women spend collecting it, supports production of fresh produce and strengthens livestock activities.
The Bank’s Feed Africa Strategy has committed $13 billion through more than 400 programmes in 54 African countries, reaching more than 64 million beneficiaries across agricultural value chains, approximately 34% of them women.
By The Numbers
- $13 billion committed through more than 400 Feed Africa programmes
- 54 African countries reached
- 64+ million Feed Africa beneficiaries
- 34% of Feed Africa beneficiaries are women
- 12+ million farmers reached through the Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT) programme
- Around 25 million tonnes of additional agricultural production through TAAT-supported technologies
Bank Officer-in-Charge and Director Fregene visits a field of TAAT-financed, heat-tolerant wheat grown by a women’s farming cooperative in Ethiopia
A major part of this work is getting agricultural innovation into farmers’ hands. Our Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT) programme has delivered innovative technologies including heat-tolerant wheat, drought-tolerant maize, and high-yielding rice to more than 12 million farmers. These technologies have contributed to an estimated 25 million tonnes of additional agricultural production.
Partnerships are central to this effort. TAAT works with research institutions, governments, farmer organisations and private companies to move proven technologies from research stations into farmers’ fields. Its maize compact established partnerships with 28 seed companies across 16 African countries to produce and distribute climate-smart maize varieties. As a result, farmers are better able to cope with drought, heat and pests while producing more food in more places.
Harvesting more food is only part of the opportunity. Africa also needs to capture more of the value created by its agricultural production. Through its Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zones programme, the Bank is investing in infrastructure that brings processing and agribusiness closer to farmers and markets. In Benin, for example, the Bank is supporting ARISE Integrated Industrial Platforms’ Glo-Djigbé Industrial Zone. ARISE created a hub where agricultural products like cashews can be processed in women-majority employee centers and transformed into higher-value goods in country – instead of abroad, earning more income for women and creating jobs.
This is where the Bank’s Four Cardinal Points strategic vision becomes tangible. Climate-smart agricultural technologies strengthen farmers’ resilience and adaptation. Mobilizing financing that allows women to buy inputs or expand a food business puts capital to work where it can generate jobs and incomes. Helping young people and women build viable agricultural businesses turns Africa’s demographic growth into economic opportunity. Investments in agro-processing zones that add robust value addition to Africa’s harvests. Climate-resilient water infrastructure that supports women’s farms and strengthens local economies.
The Bank’s Gender Marker System helps build this focus into projects from the outset. This digital dashboard assesses how Bank projects incorporate gender equality and women’s empowerment into their objectives and expected results. In 2025, 96% of all Bank projects achieved Gender Marker Category I and II, meaning gender equality was a principal objective or an intended project outcome in these projects.
When women have the technology, access to finance, climate-resilient infrastructure, skills and markets they need, they can produce more, build stronger businesses and create better opportunities for themselves, their families, their communities and their economies.
This World Food Day, in the International Year of the Woman Farmer, let us recognize the Bank staff and consultants, regional member country governments, partner organizations, project implementing units, and public and private sector leaders whose work helps connect women farmers to the resources and opportunities they need to grow. These efforts are helping women adapt to change, strengthen their livelihoods and businesses, and contribute to a more productive and resilient Africa – one that can play a more proactive, dynamic role on the world stage.
That is what it means to innovate today – and to nourish tomorrow.
About the authors
Dr. Martin Fregene is African Development Bank Group Office-in-Charge, Agriculture, Human and Social Development Vice Presidency, and also serves as Director of Agriculture and Agro-industry
Dr. Jemimah Njuki is Director for Gender, Women and Civil Society at African Development Bank Group
