Empowering grassroot organizations for sustainable impact
For over 40 years, Vi Agroforestry has partnered with farming communities to promote agroforestry and improve livelihoods. Recognizing the importance of meaningful partnerships, Vi Agroforestry has developed an Incubation Hub model to support grassroots farmer organizations. This initiative provides tailored support to organizations at early growth stages, enabling them to strengthen governance, build capacity, and better serve their communities.
Why the Incubation Hub?
Many grassroots organizations, while deeply committed to their communities, often lack the governance and systems needed to meet compliance levels required by funding organizations. These challenges can limit their ability to scale their efforts and support their members effectively. The Incubation Hub was created to address these gaps by building the capacity of grassroots farmer organizations, helping them thrive and deliver sustainable farming practices that improve livelihoods and resilience to climate change.
What the Hub offers
The Incubation Hub provides participating organizations with access to a wide range of resources and support, including:
- Organizational Capacity Assessment: A structured evaluation to create customized capacity development plans.
- Capacity Building Support: Covering governance, leadership, finance, human resources, and technical skills such as agroforestry, biodiversity, and sustainable livelihoods.
- Organizational Development Toolkit: Templates for policies, job descriptions, and other essential governance documents.
- Strategic Planning Support: Guidance on long-term planning to align with organizational goals.
- Partnership Preparedness: Assistance with proposal development and compliance for partnerships with organizations like Vi Agroforestry.
Incubation process
The incubation process includes:
- Workshops and training programs tailored to identified needs.
- Mentorship and coaching to develop governing documents and administrative tools.
- Networking opportunities to foster collaboration.
- Training in fundraising, resource mobilization, financial management, and cross-cutting areas like gender-transformative approaches and environmental impact.
A due diligence assessment is conducted toward the end of the incubation period to determine the organization’s readiness for partnership engagement.
Target beneficiaries
The Incubation Hub is currently supporting 19 organizations across East Africa, 7 in Tanzania, 7 in Uganda and 5 in Kenya.
Partners such as Farm Africa (Kenya and Uganda) and CSP (Tanzania) have been contracted to ensure effective execution of the program.
A commitment to sustainability
Manuals and materials developed through the project will remain the property of Vi Agroforestry and serve as a foundation for creating comprehensive organizational development resources for future use.
The Vi Agroforestry Incubation Hub is a testament to our commitment to strengthening grassroots organizations and fostering long-term, sustainable impact for farming communities. The project runs from January 2024 to June 2025, with a budget of SEK 3.5 million.
