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What happens when the local businesses supplying our farmers can’t access bank loans? The shortage travels down the chain—and farmers can’t plant on time.
Smallholder farmers produce 80% of Ethiopia’s food, yet under 10% access formal credit. The main bottleneck is that agro‑dealers trade mostly in cash, leaving no digital records to prove creditworthiness.
To solve this, partners met at Radisson Blu Hotel, Addis Ababa, to launch the AIRADE Agro‑Dealer Financing initiative.
Driven by Lersha, Dashen Bank, the Ministry of Agriculture, ATI, UNCDF, Gates Foundation, and Cognize Technologies, the consortium introduces an in‑kind loan model. Lersha digitizes dealer inventory to generate credit scores, enabling Dashen Bank to pay wholesalers directly for farm inputs. Dealers then supply farmers and repay loans from sales.
The project targets 108 digitized agro‑dealers, mobilize commercial lending fir ago dealers, and 54,000+ farmers reached across 36 woredas in Oromia, Sidama, Amhara, and Central Ethiopia.