AKDN | Agriculture and Food Security

Our main pillars include:

• community-led development, where AKDN supports locally-driven goals;


• agricultural assistance, which works with farmers to improve yields;


• enterprise development and employable skills, which supplements villagers’ farm-based incomes;


• natural resource management, which includes equitable water use and restoration of degraded land;


• financial inclusion, which helps smooth erratic incomes; and


• the creation of rural infrastructure that improves the quality of life, such as bridges, drinking water systems and irrigation canals.

Now in their sixth decade, these programmes are also addressing the emerging challenges of rapidly changing demography, climate change and unpredictable geopolitical circumstances.

Boosting Agricultural Yields

Agriculture remains the single largest employer in the world, providing livelihoods for 28 percent of today’s global population. Small farms worldwide provide up to 80 percent of food consumed in Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. However, 820 million people worldwide still lack regular access to adequate amounts of food. The changing climate is impacting many farmers.

Boosting agricultural yields in food-scarce areas is at the centre of the Aga Khan Foundation’s (AKF) activities. We aim to provide enduring solutions to chronic or emerging issues. For example, we are mindful of gender equity throughout our activities. It is estimated that eliminating the gender gap would lower the number of undernourished people in the world by 150 million.