Action Book 'How to tailor financing strategies for scaling project-based innovations in agri-food systems in Africa

In the domain of agricultural development in low- or middle-income countries, the vast majority of innovations are developed through time-bound R&I (research and innovation) projects, which limits their deployment beyond prototyping and small-scale experiments. Once researchers have conducted the experiments necessary to introduce new technologies, practices, organisations or services in a given territory or sector, other actors must take over to organise and facilitate all the changes and capacity building that will enable the innovation to be deployed. This is where tailored financing strategies become critical to ensure that multidimensional and multilevel interventions, activities or services can be pursued to support innovation scaling, moving the innovation from one stage to another. The absence of an adequate financing strategy with an explicit scaling strategy traps innovations in a stagnation chasm before they achieve diffusion and scaling. This action book is a guide to help R&I project leaders design a 6-step financing strategy with a scaling pathway for their innovations.