Mastercard Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund 2024

The Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity is the second phase of a program from the Mastercard Foundation. The first phase was the Mastercard Foundation Fund for Rural Prosperity, an eight-year program established in 2014. That Fund supported 38 participants from 15 countries in Africa innovating and scaling financial products and services targeting the rural population with a large focus on agriculture. One major highlight is the Fund enabled over 5.3 million people to have access to financial products and services, exceeding an initial target of 1 million.

As a result of this success and the learnings gathered, the Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity, a new, seven-year, US$ 126 million Fund was established in 2023. This Fund aims to support Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) across the agriculture, climate adaptation, and digital economy sectors in 20 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. The main objective of the Fund is to unlock enterprise growth and catalyze, scale up, and sustain the creation of dignified and fulfilling work opportunities for young women and men.

• Table of Content
• About MasterCard Foundation
• Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund
• Aim and Benefits of Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund
• Requirements for Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund Qualification
• Interview date, Process and Venue for Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund
• Application Deadline
• How to Apply

About MasterCard Foundation

The Mastercard Foundation is an international non-governmental organization established by Mastercard in 2006. The organization, which is based in Toronto, Ontario, has supported work in 49 countries.In 2018, Mastercard Foundation shifted to a specific focus on Africa, through its Young Africa Works strategy. The foundation develops programs primarily focused on reducing gender and economic inequality, expanding access to quality education, increasing the opportunities for decent work, and supporting overall economic growth.Funding is primaril... continue reading

Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund

Aim and Benefits of Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund

Interventions

The Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity aims to address a broad spectrum of SME-specific challenges as well as macro issues using four interventions:

Challenge Fund

Offering direct financial support through a challenge fund to address the resource flow barriers faced by SMEs looking to scale-up and, in turn, create and sustain employment opportunities for young women and men.

Connect Fund

Providing investor readiness support to the SMEs and negotiation of partnerships with potential financiers to ensure sustainability and growth.

Technical Assistance (TA)

Adding value beyond financial support through technical assistance and capacity building to address the barriers concerning human capital and access to markets.

Convening and influencing

Convening relevant stakeholders to encourage an enabling business environment through experienced partners and digital platforms to drive systematic change and address the issues that impede the creation of work opportunities for the youth, especially young women.

Requirements for Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund Qualification

• Each challenge fund sector is different. However, all challenges will seek proposals from SMEs that are innovative, commercially viable, and that will create dignified and fulfilling work opportunities for young women and men, young people with disabilities or refugee youth. In each challenge, applicants will be required to meet certain criteria.
• Selection will be based on applications meeting a certain threshold of the Fund selection criteria. Read more about this on the specific challenge page.

Interview date, Process and Venue for Mastercard Foundation Fund for Resilience and Prosperity Agribusiness Challenge Fund

Countries of Focus

• The Fund’s objective is to support SMEs in 20 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. This will ensure a distribution of SME-based solutions that can sustainably create dignified and fulfilling work for young men and women, young people with disabilities and refugee youth even after the end of the program.
• The countries are Benin, Burundi, Botswana, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia.

Application Deadline

How to Apply

For more details,visit Mastercard Foundation website