FAO

This session will explore how the rise of artificial intelligence is opening new pathways for the digital financial inclusion of low-income, marginalized rural actors, helping to mitigate and circumvent many of the traditional barriers that limit these actors’ capacity to access a range of different financial services (such as credit, savings and insurance) adapted to their […]

This FAO certified course introduces the Farm Business School (FBS) Forward approach, designed to strengthen business and management skills among small-scale farmers and support the development of viable rural enterprises. The program places a strong emphasis on inclusion, innovation, and collective action as key drivers of sustainable rural development. Participants will learn the principles behind […]

How can fintech expand financial inclusion for smallholder farmers and agrifood SMEs? This HASTEN lecture explores real-world innovations—like digital farmer registries and inclusive finance platforms—driving sustainable agrifood systems transformation in Africa and beyond.

As part of the CAFI SSF Network’s Talk Series, this 15 October 2025 webinar gathered experts and practitioners to explore best practices in fisheries and aquaculture cooperatives across Africa and Asia-Pacific. Organized in collaboration with FAO, the International Cooperative Alliance-Asia and Pacific (ICA-AP), and the National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC), the event spotlighted how cooperatives […]

This upcoming CAFI SSF webinar explores how credit reporting systems can be harmonized to improve the visibility and impact of financing in agriculture, forestry, fisheries, and aquaculture across Asia-Pacific.

15:00 – 16:15 pm CET *Further details on speakers and the registration link will be provided soon, please follow this page closely. Introduction Rural Finance Labs evolved out of the previous bi-monthly technical webinar series organized by the Inclusive Rural Finance team of the FAO, in collaboration with partners, under the umbrella of the CABFIN […]

*This is a self-pace E-learning course This course analyses the gender gap in agrifood systems, particularly the reasons why women are disadvantaged compared with men in starting and expanding their own agribusinesses and in benefiting from the economic opportunities offered by large-scale agricultural investments. The course aims to provide guidance to governments on issues to […]

This online event will explore actionable strategies to improve financial inclusion for rural youth, addressing key challenges and unlocking their economic and social potential. What’s in it for you? 🔹 Expert Panel Discussion: Gain insights from a diverse panel of experts as they analyze: Regulatory and sociocultural barriers limiting rural youth’s access to financial services. […]

Join us for the upcoming Rural Finance Labs where we will explore the transformative role of Fintech startups in revolutionizing rural finance. The session will feature pivotal findings from a series of Fintech case studies conducted by FAO, which will be presented by Niclas Benni, FAO Rural Finance Specialist. Joining the conversation, distinguished guest speakers […]

The global fishing fleet includes over 4 million vessels, with 2 million small-scale motorized vessels (<12 m in length) that play a crucial role in the livelihoods of coastal communities. However, only about 5 percent of these vessels are currently insured, despite a significant demand for insurance services that far exceeds the supply. Recognizing this […]

FAO’s Office of Innovation and Rural Transformation and Gender Equality Division hosts a webinar on fintech startups shaping the future of inclusive agrifood systems. This session will spotlight pioneering models and disruptive technologies that address financing constraints, while discussing the challenges startups face in achieving inclusivity, profitability, and sustainability. Discover how Digital Financial Services (DFS) […]

This is an introduction to a series of three courses designed to provide a diverse audience with the approaches, methods and tools necessary to integrate social dimensions into the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of agrifood investments. This introductory course provides an overview of social analysis and describes its importance in understanding the root causes […]

This is the third in a series of courses designed to provide a diverse audience with the approaches, methods and tools necessary to integrate social dimensions into the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of agrifood investments. This course aims to assist social analysts/field practitioners in generating primary data, using qualitative methods that can help to […]

This is the first in a series of three courses designed to provide a diverse audience with the approaches, methods and tools necessary to integrate social dimensions into the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of agrifood investments. Specifically, this course covers the management aspects of social analysis and aims to sensitize managers to the role […]

This is the second in a series of three courses, designed to provide a diverse audience with the approaches, methods and tools necessary to integrate social dimensions into the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of agrifood investments. In particular, this course provides guidance to practitioners on how to conduct social analysis to enhance the inclusiveness […]

9:00 AM Amsterdam, Berlin, Rome, Stockholm, Vienna Event Summary The event was attended by fisheries finance stakeholders from Thailand, the Philippines, and several other organizations from the Asia-Pacific region. The knowledge-sharing session had three distinguished speakers. The programme discussion began with a presentation by Dr. Raymon van Anrooy, Senior Fishery Officer/Team Leader, Fishing Technology and Operation […]

Event Summary The event was attended by more than 80 practitioners from public- and private financial service providers, fisheries and aquaculture government organizations, academic institutions, and NGOs from the Asia-Pacific and African regions. The Chief Guest for the event was Dr. Raymon VanAnrooy, Senior Fishery Officer/Team Leader, Fisheries and Aquaculture Division (FAO). Dr. VanAnrooy shared […]

*APPLICATION DEADLINE 27 October 2022 Introduction to the course ApexFinCoop is a training and strategic planning programme that aims to empower financial cooperative apex organizations and support institutions to advance the scale and effectiveness of financial cooperatives in a specific country or region. ApexFinCoop is designed to support financial cooperative apex organizations in developing and […]

Friday 11 November 2022, 16.00 -17.30 hours Bangkok (GMT+7) (11.00 am Rome, 13.00 noon Nairobi, 15.30 pm Delhi, 15:00 Bangkok) Event summary CAFI SSF Webinar Talk Series was organized on 11 November 2022. The webinar topic for discussion was Access to finance for empowering women in small-scale fisheries value chain. It was organized in association […]

 Time: 14.30-16.00 CEST Background Fulfilling the 2030 Agenda depends crucially on achieving progress in rural areas, which is where most of the poor and hungry lives. In recent years, the possibility of using public and development finance catalytically to mobilise commercial capital for investment in the agri-food sector has grown in interest. Historically, the agriculture […]

Access to micro-finance and credit by the small-scale fishers in Thailand is challenging. Financial services are the key to enable small-scale fishers to operate viable businesses and to make their fishing operations more sustainable. Many of the 1.7 million fishers in Thailand want to innovate to fish more responsible, use safer vessels,  produce higher quality […]

11.00-16.00 hours (Bangkok time) A High Level (Virtual) Regional Event was organized to present how digitalization can enable inclusive rural and agrifood system transformation under the FAO Digital Village Initiative. In particular, presentation 3 will bring in experience in “Leveraging multi-partnerships to enable digital solutions for agriculture finance: The case of Uganda“. Please see the […]

12.30 pm Bangkok, 1.30 pm Manila, 6.30 am Rome Press brief The webinar was organized by CAFI SSF Network in association with APRACA (Asia and Pacific Rural and Agricultural Credit Association) and the FAO of the United Nations on “Financing innovation for sustainable fisheries with the private sector”. More than 85 participants from financial institutions, […]

Date & Time:  29 October 2021 (10.00 am -12.00 pm Bangkok/ 6.00 am -8.00 am Nairobi/5.00 am- 7.00 am Rome/ 8.00 pm-10.00 pm Seattle)   WEBINAR PRESS BRIEF:  The webinar “Guidelines for increasing access of small-scale fisheries to insurance services” was organized by the CAFI SSF Network, in association with FAO & APRACA on 29 […]

*Webinar Press Release: AFRACA- FAO- CAFI-SSF Network, 18 August 2021 Baseline Assessment on the current situation of financial and insurance services provision to the Small-Scale Fishers (SSF) and aquaculture sectors in Africa A joint webinar was organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), African Rural and Agricultural Credit Association (AFRACA) and the Global Network […]

FAO and IFAD are hosting a webinar on applying gender transformative approaches to achieve women’s financial inclusion for improved food security and nutrition. Women’s access to quality financial products and services can contribute to the growth of their businesses and to their own economic empowerment. Yet women are less likely than men to own a […]

June 29, 2021 3:30 pm – 6:00 pm CEST Agricultural lending is considered “high risk” by formal financial institutions, as farmers are more vulnerable to changes in weather, rainfall levels, pests, and infestations, as well as price fluctuations. As a result of these perceived and actual risks, loans for smallholder farmers require high rates of […]

19 May 2021  15:00-16:30 Rome time (CEST)  Young entrepreneurs are an essential driving force for the growth of the agricultural sector, yet they face many challenges including access to formal financial services. In the framework of the FAO’s Integrated Country Approach (ICA) for boosting decent jobs for youth in the agri-food system, we have recently […]

Date & Time:  8 April (12.00 noon Bangkok, GMT +7) and (8.00 am Kenya, EAT) Organized under Global Network for capacity building to increase access of small-scale fisheries to financial services (CAFI SSF Network) Press coverage The Global Network for capacity building to increase access of small-scale fisheries to financial services (CAFI-SSF Network) organized the […]

Data on agriculture financing may be difficult to find. ATLAS offers potential to manage data analytics on agriculture financing from several sources. In addition to financial and social metrics on Financial Service Providers with agriculture portfolios, ATLAS offer agile technology to develop additional, dedicated modules to meet specific needs. ATLAS is a new data platform launched in 2020, after […]

In recognition of the well-understood macro-, meso- and micro-level challenges and risks associated with rural and agricultural finance, the need for a system-level approach to managing those risks is gaining increasing traction in the thinking and programming of the community of practice. Within this system-level view, the concept of holistic, integrated risk management as a […]

15:00 – 16:00 (CET) The goal of the webinar is to introduce risk taxonomy as a key component of operational risk management and credit risk management for microfinance institutions looking to serve farmers in developing countries.  Risk management, as a field and a body of knowledge, has been used sparsely in agriculture finance, especially at […]

Following almost seven years of implementing the AAF Technical Assistance Facility, TechnoServe is keen to share results and important lessons about how technical assistance facilities work in practice as well as how they can be optimised. The AAF TAF programme has been a proof of concept: using the vehicle of an independent technical assistance facility […]

The webinar will take place on Monday, 3 August 2015 from 15:00-16:00 CET (Rome time). The webinar will be accessible online through this link.  About the webinar Unlike conventional agricultural insurance, which indemnifies policyholders for verifiable production losses arising from multiple perils, index insurance indemnifies policyholders based on the observed value of a specific “index” […]

The Microcredit Summit Campaign is proud to present the next installment in our Campaign Commitment E-Workshops Series. The UN’s Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) and the International Labour Organization (ILO) will lead you through a discussion into new tools for understanding and mitigating the many and varied risks facing smallholder farmer. Both FAO and ILO launched Campaign Commitments in 2014. During the e-workshop […]