Seas of Change and F&BKP start collaboration on Inclusive Business

Seas of Change (SoC) and the F&BKP have signed a Letter of Engagement, formalizing the intention to collaborate on the theme ‘Inclusive Business’. The signed Letter of Engagement marks the start of a collaboration in which the F&BKP supports SoC to deepen its work to stimulate the scaling of inclusive agri-food markets. SoC’s goals will include looking to organize an inclusive business models workshop with East African small and medium size enterprises in the near future.

SoC’s network encompasses representatives from civil society, knowledge institutes, the public and private sectors. Since it first organized a successful workshop in 2012, SoC has developed into a network that is a leader in thinking about how to drive an inclusive approach to agricultural development. The main target group are small-scale producers. Activities focus on how to include this group into long term commercially viable markets, how to create new and fair employment opportunities in the sector and how to stimulate small and medium size enterprises.

Inclusive Business has been chosen as one of the key themes of the F&BKP knowledge agenda to stimulate knowledge working towards food security. Earlier this year, the F&BKP Office has reported that NWO-WOTRO enabled academia to contribute to the knowledge agenda by calling for proposals for the Global Challenges Programme that focus on inclusive business. Now, the collaboration with SoC is another important step to take the inclusive business knowledge agenda to a higher level. At the same time, the F&BKP continues to collaborate with various other networks and organizations in this field, like the BoP Innovation Center. All these efforts are intended to develop this theme further, and recognizes the need to scale up inclusive business in addressing the challenge of feeding the world’s growing population.

For more information about Seas of Change, please visit their website!