Eastern Africa

Supports and funds innovative local enterprises that can enhance food security across the region. So far, innovation challenges have supported more than 105 local enterprises with over USD 2 million in grants, catalysing over USD 20M in impact investments across the region. These enterprises provide employment and market access including for WFP beneficiaries and aim to reduce the humanitarian caseload. 

Aims to develop and commercialise local solutions, working together with academic and research institutions and supporting early-stage entrepreneurial teams in building skills, whilst strengthening the local ecosystem’s ability to commercialise research backed solutions, currently focused on local food systems. 

Collaborates with a local private sector partner to prioritise operational challenges, then use the research and development process to build an investment case for change. Currently focused on greening and reducing costs for supply-chain and logistics.

Supports WFP field staff to solve programme and operational challenges, leading to increased efficiencies and effectiveness. To date, internal innovation challenges have been delivered in Tanzania, Somalia and Rwanda.

Supported by the IGNITE Innovation Hub of Eastern Africa, WFP Ethiopia runs the IGNITE Food Systems Innovation Challenge 1.0 which aims to support locally-sourced solutions to address food insecurity and climate change challenges in the country and to empower local entrepreneurs operating in the food systems value chain.

The country office aims to improve food systems and build resilience, supporting WFP programme teams and contributing to WFP Kenya’s country strategic plan to foster innovation and innovative methodologies to achieve SDG 2 and 17.

The Rwanda Country Office is positioning innovation as a cross-cutting enabler of its strategic plan, with a strong focus on developing innovative financing initiatives. Core activities include project management for innovation, innovation sourcing and financing, culture change and knowledge management initiatives, and acceleration support for external ventures. WFP IGNITE Innovation Hub for Eastern Africa supported, the office is piloting the “Climate Smart Agriculture for Youth” initiative, to empower 2,500 young farmers in Rwanda to adopt sustainable farming practices to boost productivity, income and climate resilience. In parallel, the Post-Harvest Management innovation is testing integrated post-harvest solutions to reduce food losses and improve livelihoods.

Supported by the WFP IGNITE Innovation Hub for Eastern Africa, the Pathfinder Challenge is an internal WFP Innovation Challenge that invited WFP employees to identify and prioritize impactful problems and proposed innovative solutions that enhanced efficiency and effectiveness, in line with WFP Somalia's 2024 priorities.

WFP South Sudan aims to Identify and support local innovative solutions that enhance climate resilience and food security for local populations through training, coaching, mentorship and funding.

WFP’s first field innovation hub was established in Tanzania in 2017. Now in its sixth year, the hub has laid the groundwork for catalyzing Tanzania’s innovation ecosystem and changing the way WFP approaches both current and future operations. The hub’s work is closely aligned with the objectives of WFP Tanzania’s country strategic plan, which centers around supporting the Government of Tanzania in its effort to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, and in particular the Zero Hunger 2030 agenda. The hub’s current focus areas are in smallholder agriculture, market access and supply chain, nutrition, emergency preparedness and response, social protection, and support to refugee populations.

Uganda boasts of a vibrant and rapidly expanding innovation ecosystem. WFP Uganda is tapping into the exciting innovation talents to plug their solutions into WFP’s operations. The objective is to catalyse and scale innovative solutions that transform food security and nutrition outcomes and foster the resilience of vulnerable communities served by WFP in Uganda.