Our Mission
Our mission is to scale digital innovations for social impact. This we do through a market-based approach. We support tech start-ups from Africa, Sri Lanka and beyond to become investment ready and assist them in raising more funds for growth, by which the start-ups can scale their innovations to more customers and users. Our social impact indicators are, income generation (first and foremost), improved nutrition, adaption to climate change and reduction of food and plastic waste.
“Scaling digital Agriculture Innovations through Start-ups” (SAIS) is a programme implemented by Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).
At present, we work in the greentech sector, encompassing agtech, foodtech and climatetech. In particular in African countries, agriculture constitutes an important economic sector, which substantially contributes to GDP and employment. However, the sector is massively underserved and lacks impactful innovation. We believe, that start-ups can change this for the better.
So far SAIS has worked with more than 102 start-ups from over 22 African countries. Close to 77% of the start-ups who completed the Investment Readiness Programme (IRP) were able to raise follow-on funding, in total over 76M USD, of which the majority is equity and debt funding. The start-ups we worked with reached in total over 2.9M users, with an average of more than 79% reporting an increase in income through the innovations provided by the start-ups during or until one year after the end of the Investment Readiness Programme (IRP).
In 2024, SAIS expanded its reach to Sri Lanka through the CIRCULAR programme, focusing on the Circular Economy. The project engages with MSMEs as well as start-ups at the seed, early, and growth stages. In addition to the IRP, the Sri Lanka portfolio will include an Incubator and SME development programme for larger enterprises.
By 2029, we aim to reach 1.5M people through the start-ups with more than 1.1M people reporting an increase in income. This shall be achieved by working with at least 175 start-ups.