Access Agriculture is delighted to announce that it has been named the winner of the 2022 Arrell Global Food Innovation Award in the category of ‘Community Engagement Innovation.’

The Arrell Global Food Innovation Awards from the Arrell Food Institute at the University of Guelph, in Canada, recognise global excellence in the broad area of food innovation and community impact.

The Community Award specifically recognises those who have contributed to improved nutritional health and/or food security, with a focus on strengthening disadvantaged communities.

Congratulating Access Agriculture for being awarded with the Arrell Global Food Innovation Award for excellence in community impact, Dr. Evan Fraser, Arrell Food Institute Director, said, “Through its work, Access Agriculture has reached millions of people and made significant contributions to local food systems in communities across many countries.”

To help disadvantaged farming communities, Access Agriculture has developed innovative methods, on-line platforms, ICT tools and public-private partnership models to support last mile delivery of locally-produced, quality farmer-to-farmer training videos.

Over 220 videos in more than 90 international and local languages are currently hosted on the Access Agriculture video platform. These have reached 90 million people across the Global South, contributing to healthier and more resilient food systems. 

The members of the team, who are accepting the award on behalf of Access Agriculture are:

• Josephine Rodgers, Co-founder and Executive Director
• Paul Van Mele, Co-founder and Director for International Development and
• Jane Nalunga, Coordinator of the Rural Entrepreneur Programme

“On behalf of the Access Agriculture team and our worldwide partners, we are delighted and grateful to receive the Arrell Global Food Innovation Award,” said Josephine Rodgers. “Thanks to local community groups and grassroots organisations, we are able to identify topics relevant across the Global South, where inspirational farmers can show their peers in other countries through the videos how to farm in harmony with the environment. These resources in local languages will have a lasting impact on today’s and future rural communities.”

Access Agriculture will be attending the Arrell Food Summit 2022: The Future of Food, on June 7th.

About Access Agriculture

Access Agriculture is a non-profit organisation that works directly with community groups to produce and deliver high quality, farmer-to-farmer training videos. The video resources help to provide informative and relevant content to farmers in small communities. Access Agriculture helps to ensure the videos are available in local languages and accessible to smallholder farmers even in remote rural areas where technology, power and internet are limited. Over the past decade the videos have reached 90 million people and have contributed to healthier and more resilient food systems.

About the Arrell Food Institute

The Arrell Food Institute aims to bring people together to conduct research, train the next generation of food leaders and shape social, industrial and governmental decisions, always ensuring food is the central priority. It does this through three key themes: Transforming Food and Agriculture, Enhancing Communities’ Food Security and Enriching Food Networks.