UNSGSA Queen Máxima visits Ghanaian agribusinesses, showing how local markets can strengthen food security

Her Majesty Queen Máxima of the Netherlands, in her capacity as the United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Advocate for Financial Health (UNSGSA), today visited Ghanaian agribusinesses working with IDH Ghana to see how locally led enterprises are connecting smallholder farmers to markets, finance and decent jobs.

The visit highlights IDH Ghana’s approach to strengthening agricultural markets: working with businesses and public and private partners to address barriers that prevent farmers and agribusinesses from growing. By helping small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) aggregate, process, and sell what farmers grow, IDH supports stronger commercial relationships across value chains and creates more reliable opportunities for rural communities whilst improving the financial health of rural households.

The approach is particularly relevant as Ghana seeks to strengthen domestic food production and make agricultural value chains more resilient. Increased production alone cannot guarantee better incomes or a more secure food supply; farmers also need reliable buyers, businesses need access to finance and produce needs routes to market and processing capacity.

“Ghana’s agricultural opportunity is not only about growing more food; it is about building the markets that allow farmers and businesses to thrive,” said Robert Asugre, Country Director IDH Ghana.“By connecting smallholders to buyers, finance and enterprises that can aggregate and process their produce, we can help turn agricultural potential into more dependable incomes, jobs and stronger local food systems.”

Three Ghanaian businesses, one shared challenge

FarmMate, a wholly Ghanaian-owned agricultural value-chain company founded in 2022, works with tomato farmers to improve access to seeds, inputs, irrigation, technical advice, crop insurance and guaranteed seasonal prices. It links farmers to markets and processes surplus tomatoes into puree, helping reduce post-harvest losses and support supply beyond the main harvest season. FarmMate’s partner profile reports guaranteed market access for more than 3,000 farmers and an annual farmer payment potential of approximately US$12.5 million at full operational scale. Its operations are expected to support around 9,600 year-round farm jobs, with women and young people making up at least 70% of its hub workforce.

AgroCenta, a Ghanaian agri-fintech platform founded in 2016, connects grain farmers, particularly in Northern Ghana, with buyers, finance, market information, storage and logistics. Its farmer data can help financial institutions and investors assess creditworthiness, while its digital and on-the-ground services help producers participate more competitively in formal value chains. Since 2018, AgroCenta has facilitated the distribution of more than 70,000 metric tonnes of food. Its profile also reports a 50% increase in women’s participation as primary agricultural producers in the areas it serves.

WamiAgro serves more than 60,000 smallholder farmers across six regions through Pukpara, a platform that manages farm credit and provides access to quality inputs, training, financial literacy support and weather information in local languages. The company reports that it has deployed more than US$600,000 in input finance to approximately 5,000 farmers, with a portfolio recovery rate of around 95% and yield increases of up to 44% among participating farmers.

Together, these enterprises demonstrate different parts of the same market system: connecting producers to buyers, providing the services and finance needed to produce successfully, and improving the capacity to store, aggregate or process food. These links can help farmers manage risk, help businesses respond to demand and keep more value within Ghana’s agricultural economy.

Building markets that work for farmers and businesses

IDH Ghana works with public and private sector partners across cocoa, grains, vegetables and soy. Its model focuses on strengthening the SMEs that aggregate, process and sell farmers’ produce, while aligning incentives across value chains, unlocking buying commitments and addressing constraints that limit market participation. Young women and youth are central to this work.

Through Grains for Growth, a partnership with the Mastercard Foundation that ran from 2021 to 2024, IDH linked smallholder farmers with aggregating SMEs across five regions. IDH Ghana’s program factsheet reports that the initiative reached 49,651 farmers, supported 170,745 young people to access work and enabled US$39.4 million in investment.

Building on this experience, the Women in Sourcing and Enterprise (WISE) program works with SMEs across grains and agriculture, extending the market-led approach to crops including tomato, onion and chilli pepper. In Ghana, the program works with 16 SMEs across seven regions and targets 125,000 jobs, with 80% intended for young women and youth. WISE also runs in Nigeria and South Africa.

IDH’s Making Agrifood Markets Accessible for Soy Farmers (MAMA) program, funded by the Royal Norwegian Embassy, is strengthening the soybean value chain in five northern regions from 2026 to 2028. Working with partners including the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, Yara Ghana and the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, the programme aims to reach 10,000 farmers, 60% of them women, and enable 20,750 jobs.

For IDH, the objective is to help build agricultural markets that can endure individual projects: markets where farmers have dependable routes to buyers, enterprises can attract investment and grow, and commercial activity contributes to more inclusive livelihoods and long-term food system resilience.