The European Microfinance Platform is delighted to announce the publication of Inclusive Finance for Food Security & Nutrition, the latest in its annual series of publications that introduces the subject landscape, explores the role of the inclusive finance sector and presents case studies and best practice from that year’s European Microfinance Award (EMA).
Inclusive Finance for Food Security & Nutrition opens with an outline of the scale of the challenge, and how and why food insecurity is increasing again, after decades of progress. In the opening section, the paper introduces the definition of food insecurity and its drivers, framed within the context of sustainable food systems. Food (in)security is not a binary state but rather sits on a continuum, and can be conceptualised in various ways, but among them is the FAO’s Four Dimensions - Availability, Access, Utilisation, & Stability – around which the next section of the paper is structured. Framed broadly within these four dimensions, and featuring boxes on partnerships, technology and regulation, among others, case studies of the ten semi-finalists from the EMA 2023 (and among them the three finalists) are presented. The paper concludes with a section entitled ‘factors for success’, which condenses some of the common features of these outstanding applicant organisations and their initiatives – as well as observing where there are gaps which financial inclusion organisations can best address.
Food Security & Nutrition is a critical, complex and challenging subject, outside the typical expertise or mission of traditional microfinance institutions. So the entire EMA team has been gratified and impressed to learn about the diverse range of initiatives that the field of Award applicants have presented, and we thank and congratulate all 41 of them – and particularly those profiled in this publication – for their participation.
Thanks must also go to Luxembourg’s Directorate for Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Affairs within the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, and all the members of the Selection Committee and the High Jury who gave their time and expertise to take part in the rigorous evaluation process.
Inclusive Finance for Food Security & Nutrition opens with an outline of the scale of the challenge, and how and why food insecurity is increasing again, after decades of progress. In the opening section, the paper introduces the definition of food insecurity and its drivers, framed within the context of sustainable food systems. Food (in)security is not a binary state but rather sits on a continuum, and can be conceptualised in various ways, but among them is the FAO’s Four Dimensions - Availability, Access, Utilisation, & Stability – around which the next section of the paper is structured. Framed broadly within these four dimensions, and featuring boxes on partnerships, technology and regulation, among others, case studies of the ten semi-finalists from the EMA 2023 (and among them the three finalists) are presented. The paper concludes with a section entitled ‘factors for success’, which condenses some of the common features of these outstanding applicant organisations and their initiatives – as well as observing where there are gaps which financial inclusion organisations can best address.
Food Security & Nutrition is a critical, complex and challenging subject, outside the typical expertise or mission of traditional microfinance institutions. So the entire EMA team has been gratified and impressed to learn about the diverse range of initiatives that the field of Award applicants have presented, and we thank and congratulate all 41 of them – and particularly those profiled in this publication – for their participation.
Thanks must also go to Luxembourg’s Directorate for Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Affairs within the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, and all the members of the Selection Committee and the High Jury who gave their time and expertise to take part in the rigorous evaluation process.
Read Inclusive Finance for Food Security & Nutrition