Smart Africa & FAO Innovate Africa Challenge 2026 for AI-driven Agricultural Solution (Up to US$50,000)

Reach us on

Applications are open for Smart Africa & FAO Innovate Africa Challenge 2026. The Innovate Africa Challenge (3rd Edition), launched by Smart Africa in partnership with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), aims to accelerate the adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) solutions that address some of Africa’s most pressing agricultural and climate challenges. Under the theme “From Ideation to Deployment”, this edition focuses on moving beyond ideas and prototypes to support practical and scalable solutions that deliver measurable benefits for farmers.

From improving crop forecasting and pest detection to optimizing water use and strengthening climate resilience, AI can help transform agrifood systems across the continent. The Challenge will identify and support a proven AI-driven solution for Climate-Smart Agriculture, validating its impact in real-world farming contexts and creating pathways for wider adoption.

The selected solution will receive USD 50’000 to support deployment, validation, and scaling with farmers.

Smart Africa & FAO Innovate Africa Challenge Objectives

The challenge seeks to identify and support one proven AI-driven solution for Climate-Smart Agriculture and deploy it within a Smart Africa Member State. The selected solution will be implemented in partnership with national ministries responsible for Agriculture, ICT and Innovation, the Smart Africa Secretariat, and FAO country offices and technical experts.

The initiative aims to:

Accelerate the deployment of AI solutions in African agriculture.
Strengthen collaboration between governments, innovators, research institutions, the private sector, and farmer organisations.
Generate evidence and practical lessons to support policy development and large-scale adoption of AI technologies.

Primary Focus Areas:

The challenge will place particular emphasis on solutions addressing:

Precision agriculture and input optimization to improve resource efficiency and reduce environmental impact;
Crop yield prediction and forecasting to support proactive planning and food security;
Pest and disease surveillance, detection, and early warning; enabling timely responses and minimizing losses;
Climate risk modeling and adaptive decision support, to strengthen resilience to climate variability and shocks; and
Water and natural resource optimization.

Smart Africa & FAO Innovate Africa Challenge Expected Outcomes

The challenge is expected to deliver a scalable and context-validated AI solution capable of improving farmers’ decision-making, productivity, and climate resilience.
It also seeks to strengthen multi-stakeholder collaboration across the agricultural innovation ecosystem while generating evidence, best practices, and a replicable model for scaling AI-enabled climate-smart agriculture across Africa.

Eligibility Criteria

The challenge is open to startups, innovators, and solution developers actively developing or deploying AI-driven solutions for climate-smart agriculture.

Applicants must demonstrate: