By Sam Mendelson, November 2023
Inclusive Finance for Food Security & Nutrition: Lessons and Best Practices from the European Microfinance Award 2023 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.
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