Call for Applications: Stability-and-Peace Accelerator Programme

They are calling on innovators, entrepreneurs and changemakers to come forward with groundbreaking solutions that can drive resilience, ensure food and nutrition security, enhance climate adaptability and promote social cohesion and sustainability among communities battered by conflict and fragility.

The WFP Innovation Accelerator and CGIAR will support selected teams through a comprehensive programme designed to accelerate the development of promising solutions and prepare them for scaling. Alongside financial, technical and business support, this includes the provision of scientific advisory, aimed to improve the innovator’s ability to create life-changing sustainability impact.

They encourage organizations to submit their innovative solutions that help end hunger, reinforce communities against unexpected disruptions, ensure consistent access to nutritious food, foster inclusive economic opportunities, engage youth and enhance the resilience of food systems amidst the challenges of climate change.

What They Offer?

This collaboration between CGIAR & the WFP Innovation Accelerator, specifically through the CGIAR Initiative on Fragility, Conflict, and Migration, marks a significant union of efforts. The WFP Innovation Accelerator, with its track record of organizing 55 innovation bootcamps, supporting over 487 teams and field testing more than 100 solutions, has positively impacted 37 million people in 2022 alone. Merging this with CGIAR’s dedicated research agenda, which aims to deliver science and innovation that advance the transformation of food, land, and water systems in a climate crisis, the collaboration will enhance climate resilience, gender equity and social inclusion. Together, they aim to address the complex challenges associated with the climate crisis aiming to provide sustainable solutions for the most vulnerable populations.

What they offer to boost innovations?

• Six-month Sprint acceleration programme combining business-oriented training, mentoring, and science-based technical assistance from the WFP Innovation Accelerator
• Access to the research network of CGIAR, the world’s largest publicly funded research-for-development organization
• In-country strategy workshop to kick off implementation
• US$30,000 equity-free grant for each of the winning innovations with a proven sustainable business model and scaling plan
• Exposure to national and international funders
• Post-acceleration support

What They Are Looking For?

For this Innovation Challenge, CGIAR and the WFP Innovation Accelerator are looking for both low- and high-tech solutions specifically tailored to meet distinct challenges present in fragile and conflict-affected settings (FCAs) specifically in Jordan, Kenya, Nigeria, and Yemen. They aim to identify and support exceptional innovations from around the world that hold the potential to address these challenges on a significant scale. Applicants are requested to showcase a high-impact, scalable solution that matches one of the four innovation themes. The innovation themes per country are:

• Water and Resilience in Refugee and Host Communities in Jordan:
  • Decentralized water purification systems for refugee camps and remote communities
  • Efficient irrigation systems for water-scarce farming communities
  • Tech-enabled soil health monitoring for optimized land use
  • Rainwater harvesting systems for households and small farms
  • Solutions to enhance water access and resilience in refugee and host communities
  • Scalable solutions for urban agriculture and vertical farming
• Digital Solutions for Climate Security and Migration in Kenya:
  • Digital solutions for comprehensive assessment of host community vulnerabilities
  • Solutions for conflict prediction and mitigation
  • Solutions for forecasting and reducing the impact of environmental disasters
  • Digital solutions for enhancing communication and information flow between refugees and aid organizations
  • Digital platforms for mapping environmental, conflict, and instability data to identify displacement patterns
  • Solutions for refugees to access safe routes and hazard information on their journey
• Resilient Food Systems and Nutrition in Nigeria:
  • Innovative cold storage solutions to prevent post-harvest loss
  • Soil fertility management solutions for cocoa to increase productivity and achieve climate-smart cocoa production
  • Linking seed production with demand, particularly for vegetatively-propagated crops
  • Mobile platforms for market access and fair pricing for smallholder farmers
  • Fortification of staple foods to address micronutrient deficiencies
  • Agri-tech for precision farming and resource management
  • Localized food processing technologies to increase shelf-life
  • Biofortified crop development for nutrient-rich food options
• Water and Resilience in Conflict-Affected Areas in Yemen:
  • Affordable water purification systems to provide safe drinking water in conflict-affected areas
  • Small-scale water-efficient agricultural technologies to mitigate the impact of disrupted agricultural production and water scarcity on food security
  • Water and sanitation solutions for conflict-affected communities
  • Waste-to-energy solutions for sustainable land management
  • Off-grid water systems to provide affordable and safe water access in conflict-affected communities
  • Climate-resilient water management and agricultural practices to cope with the compounded effects of conflict, natural disasters, and climate change impacts on water resources and food security

Eligibility Criteria

• Your organization must be an established legal entity (for-profit, not-for-profit, social business, NGO, INGO).
• Your organization should have a presence or willingness to build a presence in one of the four countries of implementation (Jordan, Kenya, Nigeria or Yemen). This could take the form of a country office or other permanent presence, subsidiary, long-term operations or partnerships in the country.
• Your innovation addresses one or more of the priority innovation areas related to pressing challenges faced in the humanitarian space of the country of implementation.
• Your innovation should have reached the minimum viable product stage and is gearing up for scale.
• Your innovation should have a clear pathway to scale and a potential plan to implement during the six-month Sprint with the available funding.
• Applicants are expected to have strong intentions to collaborate with relevant humanitarian stakeholders, build relationships with CGIAR country offices, and connect with the innovation ecosystems.
• The applicants should demonstrate a clear need for research and development for the conceptual and commercial development of their innovation.

Evaluation Criteria

• Level of innovation/innovativeness: The solution is novel, innovative and has a strong social impact regarding the mentioned themes.
• Relevance to the context: The solution addresses at least one of the priority areas, is suitable to at least one of the four country contexts, and provides concrete solutions to end-users/target beneficiaries.
• Sustainability and scalability of the solution: The solution presents a clear business model and sustainable revenue model.
• Quality of the team: Proven competence, technical coherence, commitment, motivation, Entrepreneurial mindset, diverse and inclusive team.
• Clearly defined needs: The solution has an area of expansion or improvement, which can be saturated through venture and capacity building as well as research and development.

For more information, visit CGIAR.