Cultivating the Drylands Challenge
Climate smart agriculture
Sustainable Development Goals (SDG)
What would a challenge prize look like? Imagine a world where people living in increasingly arid conditions achieve food security through healthy, resilient and locally-produced food.
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Shaping tech and innovation
The problem
Why a challenge prize
Approximately half the world’s population is experiencing extreme water scarcity, which makes growing food a complex challenge. Globally, land used to grow food may lose up to 10% of its productivity by 2050 due to the effects of severe climate change.17 This challenge is in addition to the need to satisfy an anticipated >60% increase in global food demand by 2050.18 Alongside their vulnerability to climate change, our food systems are also a leading cause of climate change. We urgently need to develop innovative ways of growing the food we need while reducing our food systems’ impact on the planet.
Unlocking systemic change will require more than technological breakthroughs. The farming communities who are most vulnerable to climate change typically have the least capacity to innovate. This means that it is imperative that we take community-driven approaches to developing, testing and scaling solutions that address problems, whilst also avoiding negative consequences for the wider system. The challenge will de-risk the innovation cycle and level the playing field so that a range of stakeholders, including those who are community-based, can engage and innovate on equal footing. It will act as a brokerage opportunity to facilitate the formation of these inclusive and collaborative partnerships. In addition to supporting innovative solutions and partnerships, the challenge will unlock systemic change by acting as a transparent platform generating evidence of what works to transition towards a more sustainable global agricultural system.
Shaping tech and innovation
Providing funding and investment
Community engagement
Supporting partnerships
Capacity building
What are the outcomes? Climate smart solutions
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Economic improvement
Reliably increased crop yields
Fostering community based approaches
£5M to the solution that most effectively enables smallholder farmers to increase agricultural production of cereal crops in an arid location using limited resources The Cultivating the Drylands Challenge will push the boundaries of agricultural technologies and practices. It will focus on resilient and water-savvy farming to support farmers to consistently boost crop yields and enhance food security. Solutions could include sustainable closed-loop systems and resource recycling;
smart and precise management approaches; new materials and soil innovations; to biotechnological breakthroughs. Successful solutions will work hand-inhand with smallholder farmers to sustainably increase food production while building their own climate resilience.
INDICATIVE TIMELINE 17. H.-O. Pörtner et al., Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, IPCC (2022).
Month 12
Month 24
Developing proof of concept
Piloting and scaling
- Innovator outreach
- Capacity building
- Capacity building
- Consortium building
- Grant funding
- Repayable loans
- Submission of proof of concepts
- Piloting and testing through farm demonstrations
- Developing business models
- Semi-finalists selected
18. M. Van Dijk et al., A meta-analysis of projected global food demand and population at risk of hunger for the period 2010–2050, Nature Food, 2, 494-501 (2021).
22
Month 1 Open call
Climate Possible: How funders can accelerate innovation for a resilient future
- Finalists selected
- Generating evidence - Final submissions
Month 48 Selection of winners - 5M to the winning team