Deadline Date: January 16, 2026
The Youth Entrepreneurship for the Future of Food and Agriculture (YEFFA) program invites grant concept notes from qualified organizations in Ethiopia to implement projects that empower youth, particularly young women, in agrifood systems.
The focus areas of the YEFFA program include expanding market access and ensuring dignified income by integrating youth into structured commodity systems and linking them to buyers, fostering inclusive policies and strengthening the entrepreneurship ecosystem through collaboration with government and stakeholders, improving sustainable agricultural productivity via technology transfer, mechanization, digital tools, and incubation support, deepening financial inclusion through fintech solutions and credit guarantees, and amplifying youth voices in policy dialogue while building leadership and soft skills. The program prioritizes youth, gender, and inclusiveness in all interventions.
The program aims to deliver tangible outcomes including linking 100,000 smallholder farmers, with 80% being young women, to various project interventions, providing at least 45,000 young people with dignified jobs across agricultural value chains, supporting at least 10,000 youth farmers in structured trade, increasing the volume and value of sales for supported MSMEs by 150%, offering at least USD $4 million in financial products, services, and loans to target young women agri-enterprises, establishing or supporting at least five functional multi-stakeholder platforms for youth voice, and ensuring that at least 80% of supported agri-enterprises and young women farmers receive agricultural advisory and climate-smart extension services.
The maximum grant period for the YEFFA program is 49 months, from 1 March 2026 to 1 March 2030, and each concept note should be contextualized to the specific solution being proposed. Eligible applicants include well-established private companies, SMEs, BDS professionals with a track record of service delivery to value chain actors working with youth and women, civil society organizations, social enterprises, agri-tech firms, research institutions, market facilitators, and local think tanks engaged in agricultural development. Organizations must be registered in Ethiopia, demonstrate sound financial condition, sufficient capacity, favorable past performance, adherence to industry standards and national regulations, and promote inclusivity and sustainability principles in their activities.
For more information, visit AGRA.
