At Finding XY, the first quarter of 2023 is moving on rather well across the different implemented projects. In this newsletter, we share with you updates on the Women in Agriculture Impact Investment (WAII) Facility,the Adaptation Fund and the Climate finance and business advisory training of trainers.
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Eddie Sembatya,
C.E.0
THE WOMEN IN AGRICULTURE IMPACT INVESTMENT (WAII) FACILITY.
Finding XY continues to build a strong pipeline of female-led Agri SMEs in both Kenya and Uganda looking to raise investment in debt or equity financing through the Women in Agriculture Impact Investment (WAII) Facility. The facility continues to partner with institutional and impact investors to accelerate investment in female-led Agri-SMEs. Since the facility launch in June 2022, we have partnered with investors including, Nordic Impact Funds ,I Gravity and Asante Financial services! We look forward to engaging with more investors to address the “gender gap” through Gender Lens Investment and a blend of development and commercial finance.
In a bid to continue supporting female led Agri-SMEs realize their growth potential, Finding XY held an Investment Readiness Accelerator Workshop For Female-led Agri-SMEs. The purpose of the workshop was to significantly move Agri-enterprises towards financial sustainability and investment readiness through the preparation of investor documents, growth strategy, and financial management.
The Accelerator Workshop was followed by a successful Women in Agriculture Impact Investment Facility Investor Pitch Day on 5th April, 2023. The pitch day gave investors an opportunity to meet the founders of our curated pipeline female led Agri-SMEs and learnt more about their businesses.
This was an excellent opportunity for the investors to explore the potential of investing in these female Agri-SMEs, partnering with the Women in Agriculture Impact Investment Facility and expanding their portfolio in a growing and impactful industry.
WAII is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) under the Feed the Future Uganda Inclusive Agricultural Markets Activity and is implemented by Finding XY.
THE ADAPTATION FUND
On 6th April, 2023, at an event dubbed “The National Adaptation Stakeholder Workshop”, Finding XY working with UNIDO, Kenya Climate Ventures and adelphi had the pleasure of introducing a project intended to unlock financing for female and youth led adaptation SMEs in Kenya and Uganda, to numerous stakeholders in Government, financial institutions, adaptation SMEs, Donor agencies, BDS providers, civil society and the end-users (vulnerable groups representatives).
This 5 year project will be structured around three components i.e. (1) Establishing a Regional Coordination Platform (RCP) to connect adaptation, climate smart lending, entrepreneurship, knowledge management and promote cross learning, (2) Innovative performance- based blended financing mechanism, investment brokerage services and direct enterprise support, (3) Local financing institutions support gender- and youth inclusive adaptation SMEs.
The workshop featured break-out sessions where participants shared key challenges for adaptation SMEs, vulnerable groups and proposed solutions, unveiled the proposed financing mechanisms, market segments served, and financing need of adaptation SMEs and assessed the feasibility of the proposed solutions.
The workshop saw a successful realization of adaptation SMEs’ potential in providing cost-effective and localized adaptation solutions to vulnerable communities in climate change susceptible geographies in Uganda and Kenya.
At the end of the project, the finance facility in combination with targeted business and post-investment advisory support will help these SMEs to overcome the missing middle financing gap and related challenges to grow and replicate their business operations, thus, widening the outreach and deployment of adaptation solutions to vulnerable groups.
CLIMATE FINANCE AND BUSINESS ADVISORY TRAINING OF TRAINERS (TOT).
With an intention to build trainer’s capacity to offer quality business and climate finance advisory services to micro, small and medium sized enterprises in Uganda, Finding XY has launched the” Climate Finance and Business Advisory Training of Trainers.” The Training shall provide a suite of tools and templates that trainers can use to adapt to their work so they can design and deliver relevant support to climate smart enterprises and the ecosystem.
Over time, Finding XY has curated a pipeline of Climate Smart Business Advisors, investors and professionals critical to bridging the knowledge on climate finance trends and business advisory services. The purpose of the training of trainers shall therefore be to equip advisors with practical and comprehensive understanding of climate finance including adaptation, mitigation and resilience, funding trends, and taxonomies and for them to network and learn from experts in the field of climate finance and business advisory.
The 6 day event is tentatively scheduled for 5th-9th June 2023 and will cost each trainee UGX.1, 500, 000. At the end of the event, we will keep in touch with trainers to share experiences, challenges and if necessary further training especially in the delivery of training and business advisory solutions whether in person or through online training.