News & Insights

In spite of what the title might suggest, we’re not going to tell you the story of a Walt Disney princess who found the prince of her dreams. Our heroine is Merab, a sweet and charismatic young woman from Uganda. Our featured adventure is her Generation Food journey and her metamorphosis into a successful businesswoman, and beyond. Let’s start from the beginning.

Hope Dina is about to launch her own organic pesticide and fertiliser. The Generation Food programme in Uganda gave her a push to make her business idea come true. She hopes her story inspires government and private companies to create an environment that supports young entrepreneurs to flourish.

Rice is critical to Vietnam's socio-economic development, whereas rice cultivation is severely impacted by climate change. By applying the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP) standard, rice farmers can now significantly reduce inputs and costs.

Deo runs Eastern Coffee, a coffee-roasting company in Mbale, Uganda. He is involved in Rikolto's Generation Food programme in Uganda. Learn about the values that guide him as a young agrifood entrepreneur, something he is eager to share with other young people on the same path.

In this podcast episode, Jelle talks with our colleague Robinson Nakwasa from Rikolto in Uganda and with Piloya Innocent. She is one of the promising entrepreneurs shaping the future of Uganda's food economy through the Generation Food-project.

Bui Thi Ngoc Duyen, a young woman, has successfully been applying the knowledge and skills she gained during a training course in her agricultural business. Her dream: becoming a safe agricultural product distributor.

As of 2021, a participatory guarantee system or PGS has been adopted by 43 vegetable cooperatives in the capital of Vietnam, Hanoi. PGS is now recognised as a certification system for safe vegetables in Hanoi as well as in Vinh Phuc, Ha Nam, and Da Nang. How has this been achieved, and what does it mean for access to healthy and safe food in Vietnam? In this article, we tell you all about it.

In collaboration with Rikolto and the RUAF Global Partnership on Sustainable Urban Agriculture and Food Systems, FAO released on 29th July 2022 the Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture Sourcebook – From Production to Food Systems.

Together with ILVO, Inagro, three producers of chickpeas, three processors (Greenyard, Deldiche and Abinda), supermarket chain Delhaize and the NGO Rikolto, Arteveldehogeschool will investigate for two years how the chickpea grown in Flanders can become economically viable.

Awa watched her son leave 7 years ago from Burkina Faso to pursue better economic opportunities. When the 28-year-old Adama was forced to return, he found that members of the farmers' cooperative of his community were calling on him to join. What opportunities did mother and son find in collaborating for a more professional farmers' organisation?

Tuy Loan is a vegetable cooperative in Vietnam that, after 5 years of working to professionalise its operations and improve access to markets, has succeeded in increasing the income of its farmers and the quality of its vegetables. From supplying only one food store, it now supplies high-quality vegetables to several supermarkets and stores in Da Nang, Vietnam. In this article, our colleague Nguyen Thi Den tells us how they did it.

Besides trying to keep up with fast-paced population growth, cities in Africa have been facing several other crises, such as pandemics, climate change and war. Amidst these challenges are also opportunities on the road to recovery of local food systems.This is the reason why for this #AfricanCITYFOODmonth campaign, Rikolto has decided to put innovation and multi-stakeholder collaborations as game-changers to strengthen resilience within cities’ food systems.

One of the approaches that Rikolto promotes in our sustainable production strategy is the practice of regenerative agriculture. In this article, we share insights from Pasar Rakyat Bali, our Food Smart Cities partner that has been putting regenerative farming into action.

On the way to COP26, sixteen Farm to Fork local dialogues were organised in Wales, Scotland, Philippines, Peru, Nigeria, Tanzania, Mexico, Kenya, Ecuador, South Africa, and Belgium to help build trust between farmers and local policymakers. Rikolto facilitated the dialogues in Ecuador and in Belgium. Discover the materials harvested during these dialogues!

SMEs usually make up over 90% of businesses in the agri-food sector, create half the sector’s economic value, provide more than half its jobs, and handle more than half the food consumed. In Burkina Faso, Hado, a food entrepreneur with 40 years of experience running informal businesses joined an entrepreneurship programme funded by Enabel to professionalise her business idea. Learn about the beginning of her story in this article.

This school year we experimented with offering smoothies and soup at several secondary schools in Antwerp. The smoothies and soup made of vegetable and fruit surpluses. This is done through a wonderful cooperation with Foodsavers of the city of Antwerp, delivered to the school gate! The fact that they are made from food surpluses is the reason for a very accessible price. All of this is part of the Get Wasted project.

We are looking for a team to develop a virtual learning platform for Rikolto that offers streamlined onboarding of new colleagues; internal courses and provides resources and training to develop relevant competences. Are you interested? submit your proposals by July 8, 2022!

Rikolto is looking for an analytical and reliable Finance and Accounting Officer. You will be part of an enthusiastic and diverse international team. We look forward to welcoming you to a warm environment. Something for you? Then send your cover letter and CV before the 3 of July. But don't wait so long. We look forward to meeting you soon!

We are looking for a Cocoa and Coffee Programme Manager for Ghana. Do you want to join our team to contribute to making these sectors more #sustainable, #competitive and inclusive? Apply until the 30 June 2022!

During three days, more than 40 producers, academics and government representatives from Peru and Ecuador gathered in Cajamarca (Perú), for an exchange of experiences and lessons on mitigating the carbon footprint of coffee production. It was the kick-off event of the project “More coffee and less CO2” project in Ecuador that aims to encouragee strategies and policies for high yields of carbon neutral coffee.

We're looking for an energetic and friendly management assistant who wants to grow in a support role with a wide variety of tasks. Apply by 18 May 2022.

FAO and Rikolto are joining forces to set up two networks to increase policymakers’ awareness and capacity on urban food systems governance and to improve urban food markets so they can contribute to more sustainable food systems. Read more bout these 2 initiatives in this article.

Five years ago, we introduced you to Freddy Mairena, a Nicaraguan cocoa farmer. Freddy’s honest and friendly smile can be found today in the promotional images of the Boni "Nicaragua" chocolate in the Colruyt Group retail shops in Belgium. Here is Freddy’s story now: from producer to entrepreneur.

In this project, Rikolto sought to attract the young generation's interest in agriculture through digital-based farming and agripreneurship. 

Throughout the year, we can count on enthusiastic interns: sometimes, they surprise us with their social media magic, sometimes their study topic brings us new insights. Eva Van De Putte joined our Food Smart Cities team, and wraps up her internship with this blogpost, in which she unpacks the definition of food governance, inclusive markets and interconnectivity.

Rikolto joined forces with Colruyt Group, Entreprise Cooperative de Saint Paul (ECSP), Puratos, Access Agriculture, Agro Insight and Fairtrade Belgium to move towards a living income for cocoa farmers in Ivory Coast. One year after the start of the project, we take a look at the first results.

The agreement seeks to position and reinforce Peru's differentiation as an exporter of quality cocoa, with verified origin attributes and deforestation-free by 2025. Rikolto is joining 19 organisations from the cocoa value chain in the country to promote this important initiative, within the framework of the Coalition for Sustainable Production.

Fernando García went from producing in a monoculture model to developing a diversified farm cultivating cocoa, grains, fruit, and timber. The 67-year-old farmer learned about cocoa cultivation from scratch.

The Multistakeholder facilitation process - a toolkit offers the essential concepts, tools and attitudes needed to make multi-stakeholder collaboration work in food systems.

Are supermarkets helping us to eat sustainably? That question is the subject of a new comparative research by Questionmark Foundation, supported by Rikolto and Test Aankoop.