Sustainability Abroad: The One Acre Fund
In East Africa, agriculture serves as the backbone of most countries’ economies, however agricultural productivity in these areas has consistently dropped in recent years. There are multiple factors contributing to this decline including degradation of natural resources, decreased market access, low investment in training and research, and general reduction of human health/life expectancy. One Acre Fund, a start-up non profit organization based in East Africa, is working to combat these issues; through implementing a business strategy model, the organization is helping farmers in rural areas of Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania to build a smallholder network and increase regional agricultural productivity. One Acre Fund is working with established systems in ways that promote collaboration among communities and create a realistic platform from which to address some of the world’s most pressing environmental and social problems related to agriculture.
As a relatively new organization, One Acre Fund has already taken great strides in improving the harvest yields of farmers in rural East Africa. By constructing a sustainable market system made up of a four-component process (providing farmers with credit and supplies, delivering materials directly to isolated geographic areas, training farmers to improve their production methods, and increasing harvest sales by opening access to markets), representatives from One Acre Fund are empowering farmers to improve the profitability of their land and eliminate hunger and poverty in their communities. They estimate that in 2020, their organization will serve 1 million farm families (consisting of more than 5 million people) and these farmers will produce enough surplus to support another 5 million neighbors.
The unique combination of staff that One Acre Fund brings together is key in maintaining the sustainability of the organization. The collaborative efforts of local farmers and international workers allow One Acre Fund to promote leadership development and an outlet for career growth, both domestically and abroad. One Acre Fund is expected to grow substantially in the years to come: multiple pilot locations in different African countries are being explored and the organization has successfully built the capacity to open a new country operation every year. One Acre Fund’s approach to sustainability has effectively combined a business model method with local entities, international development staff, government officials and private sector groups to create a system that produces results in these rural communities. Through this innovation, investment and collaborative effort, One Acre Fund is contributing to drastic positive changes in the status of agricultural production and distribution in East Africa and serving as an example for sustainable organizational and community development.
Check out their website at http://www.oneacrefund.org.
-Erika Hoffman