{"id":9193,"date":"2026-11-04T17:31:32","date_gmt":"2026-11-04T17:31:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/2026\/11\/04\/ifc-backs-15-african-agritech-startups-to-expand-farm-financing\/"},"modified":"2026-11-04T17:31:32","modified_gmt":"2026-11-04T17:31:32","slug":"ifc-backs-15-african-agritech-startups-to-expand-farm-financing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnigerianews.com\/index.php\/2026\/11\/04\/ifc-backs-15-african-agritech-startups-to-expand-farm-financing\/","title":{"rendered":"IFC backs 15 African agritech startups to expand farm financing"},"content":{"rendered":"

After two decades of false starts, the International Finance Corporation has selected 15 agritech companies across the continent, backing them with equity while deploying portfolio guarantees to link them directly to the balance sheets of nearly 200 commercial banks. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

For the past two decades, the quest to modernise African agriculture through technology has been littered with failed pilots, undercapitalised startups, and commercial lenders unwilling to venture beyond urban corporate headquarters. Yet, with the continent importing an estimated $90 billion in staple food commodities annually\u2014a reliance that directly fuels currency depreciation and sticky inflation\u2014the pressure to industrialise domestic food production has shifted from a development ambition into a macroeconomic imperative.<\/p>\n

Speaking on the sidelines of the Africa Financial Industry Summit (AFIS) in Luanda, Aliou Maiga, Director of the Financial Institutions Group for Africa at the International Finance Corporation (IFC)<\/a>, revealed that the private-sector lending arm of the World Bank Group is rolling out a continental framework designed to solve agricultural finance once and for all.<\/p>\n

The strategy marks a departure from the venture-capital model that previously pushed agritech startups to take on balance-sheet lending risk. Instead, the IFC is positioning agritech companies as digital origination and field-management engines, while channelling commercial bank liquidity into rural smallholder value chains backed by IFC risk-sharing guarantees.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have been looking for solutions in this space for about 20 years,\u201d Maiga explained to TechCabal on Wednesday. \u201cWe explored the possibilities back then, but the technology was not sufficiently developed. We tried again about 10 years ago, but the conditions still weren&apos;t right. This time, we have identified 15 agritech companies across Africa, with coverage spanning much of the continent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under this tripartite model, the IFC provides direct equity investment to these 15 vetted agritech firms to help them complete product development and achieve commercial scale. Rather than forcing these startups to raise expensive debt to lend directly to farmers\u2014a practice that has strained balance sheets across the African tech ecosystem\u2014the IFC connects them directly to its continental network of nearly 200 commercial banks and institutional lenders.<\/p>\n

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