When African Smallholders Access Finance, They’ll Show You What’s Possible

Dr. Agnes Kalibata, speaking at the opening ceremony of the Africa Food Systems Forum in 2019. Credit: Wikimedia CommonsOpinion by Agnes Kalibata (nairobi, kenya)Thursday, September 24, 2026Inter Press Service NAIROBI, Kenya, September 24 (IPS) - I was born in Rwanda, but my family soon became refugees in Uganda during the conflict and unrest on the cusp of independence. My father was a teacher and went to great lengths to make sure I was well educated. My parents were also smallholder farmers, and I saw firsthand the challenges my parents and other refugee families faced. After I received my doctoral degree from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, I returned to a new Rwanda in 2005, managing a World Bank agriculture project with the government. In 2008, I became Minister of Agriculture and Animal Resources, and over the next six years, I oversaw the country’s transition from food deficit to food security, as Rwanda cut its global hunger index by more than 50 percent. We implemented what we understood to be true: effective deliberate agricultural investment drives poverty down. Agricultural growth is up to four times more effective at reducing poverty than growth in other s...