Access Agriculture awards

On 7 June 2022, the Access Agriculture team received the 2022 Arrell Global Food Innovation Award in the category of Community Engagement Innovation in Toronto, Canada. The team comprised Josephine Rodgers, Executive Director; Paul Van Mele, Director for International Development; and Jane Nalunga, Coordinator of the Rural Entrepreneur Programme, who joined the event remotely.

“Local indigenous languages and indigenous knowledge really are at the core of what Access Agriculture does,” said Josephine Rodgers, accepting the Award. She emphasised that sharing knowledge between communities across countries is vital to cope with changes and crises. “We are partway through the UN Decade of Family Farming and in the first year of the UN Decade of Indigenous Languages, and we aim to make both count.”

The Arrell Global Food Innovation Awards recognise global excellence in food innovation and community impact. The Awards are adjudicated by a group of internationally respected scientists and community activists. 

Handing over the Award, Adrianne Xavier, Acting Director, Indigenous Studies Programme at McMaster University, who served as an adjudicator of the 2022 Awards, remarked, “The Access Agriculture video resources provide information and relevant content to farmers in small communities, which is critical to local food systems in the Global South.” 

The Award ceremony was held during the 5th Annual Arrell Food Summit, which bought together food leaders and experts to co-create solutions and discuss how to work together to ensure a healthy and resilient future of food.

In keeping with the Summit’s focus and Access Agriculture’s vision, Paul Van Mele said, “We try to strengthen farmers’ knowledge, but also society at large to produce, process and consume food with greater respect for nature and local culture. This award is a recognition of the contribution of our staff and the hundreds of partners, who make use of our videos to train farmers in their own communities to promote agroecology and regenerative farming.”

The Award panel highlighted that Access Agriculture was selected for its model, outreach, and delivery of training videos in local languages, along with the engagement created at the community level, all of which contributes to healthier and more resilient food systems. 

Thanking the panel for its support and encouragement, Jane Nalunga said, “This is a great recognition of the young people, who are providing services to remote rural communities across Africa and now in South Asia too, using solar powered smart projectors to show videos of farmers inspiring other farmers in local languages. We are delighted to be recognised and aim to expand our activities with these wonderful rural people.”

Related links:
Video podcast : Access Agriculture receives 2022 Arrell Award
Audio podcast : Access Agriculture receives 2022 Arrell Award
News release : Access Agriculture honoured with the 2022 Arrell Global Food Innovation Award for excellence in community impact

Access Agriculture has won the prestigious International Innovation Award for Sustainable Food and Agriculture in the category “Award for innovations that empower youth in sustainable food systems” based on its model of young entrepreneurs.

The jury panel, chaired by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the Government of Switzerland, announced the winners at the World Food Forum event on October 1st, 2021. In total, there were 400 entries from 83 countries.

The jury praised Access Agriculture’s model of young entrepreneurs screening videos on ecological and organic farming and food processing, using solar powered smart projectors to reach remote communities without the need for electricity, internet connection or mobile phone signal.

Access Agriculture will use the prize money to expand its network of young Entrepreneurs for Rural Access in developing countries.

Josephine Rodgers, Executive Director, stated “We see this as a highly replicable model, not only for youth employment and business development, but also to help famers transition towards agroecology, boost their incomes and thereby contribute to more sustainable food systems.”

“It is indeed a great honour for Access Agriculture to win this award. It encourages us and instils confidence in us for reaching remote communities across the globe. With our rich library of farmer-to-farmer training videos in more than 90 languages, we are well placed to contribute to South-South learning and help mainstream agroecology,” she added.

For more information see:

• www.accessagriculture.org
• Details of Existing Young Entrepreneurs
• Young Entrepreneur Challenge Fund

Access Agriculture was declared as the winner of the Prize Digital for Development (D4D) in the ‘iStandOut’ category during the Innovation Fair & Awards Ceremony, organized by the Royal Museum for Central Africa, on 4 October 2018 in Brussels, Belgium. The Awards ceremony was presided by Mr Alexander De Croo, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance, and Minister for Development Cooperation.

Prize D4D is a biennial initiative of the Royal Museum for Central Africa with the support of the Directorate-General for Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Aid (DGD).

The Prize rewards outstanding initiatives that use digitisation and new technologies as a lever towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Access Agriculture, which is a world-leading organisation for quality agricultural training videos in local languages working across the Global South, was congratulated by the selection jury for its effective innovative approach and outstanding outreach.

The jury observed that the online video platform of Access Agriculture was the best success story in the category iStandOut. “Using Access Agriculture training videos in local languages, farmers from the South could learn sustainable agriculture technologies from each other.”

The innovative digital approach, technologies and partnerships used by Access Agriculture has enabled global access to quality training videos in local languages and has transformed the lives of millions of farmers.

Today more than 200 broadcast-quality agricultural training videos in over 80 languages are hosted on the open-access video platform of Access Agriculture www.accessagriculture.org

Access Agriculture invested the prize of 10,000 Euro in its Young Entrepreneur Challenge Fund to support local entrepreneurs in the South to start a business around last mile delivery of its farmer-training videos.

Access Agriculture took home the Gold award in the ‘Innovation’ category of the EVCOM Clarion Awards at an international ceremony, held on 7 October 2016, London UK. It also received a highly recommended award in the ‘Learning and Education’ category.

The EVCOM Clarion Awards are the leading event and communication awards that recognise performance in corporate social responsibility (CSR) and sustainability, including environment, diversity, equality, community, charity initiatives, education, ethics, health and welfare issues. 

Access Agriculture, which promotes “farmer to farmer” videos in international and local languages, was singled out for the imaginative way in which videos can be accessed by the target audience either directly or through extension staff. Its video platform provides an invaluable resource of agricultural training videos in local languages to enable farmers from around the world to share knowledge and skills.

Access Agriculture was established in 2012 and registered as an international non-profit organisation (AISBL), in Belgium. It is a global service provider that supports South–South learning among farmers and rural businesses by making available its quality agricultural training videos on agroecology and rural entrepreneurship in international and local languages.

Today more than 200 broadcast-quality agricultural training videos in over 80 languages are hosted on the open-access video platform of Access Agriculture www.accessagriculture.org