We believe progress happens when diverse voices come together with purpose. In a world defined by disruption and opportunity, collaboration and dialogue is how we unlock lasting solutions. By sharing insights from our partners across civil society, philanthropy, academia, faith-based organizations, the private sector, and beyond, we aim to amplify ideas that inspire, inform, and drive tangible results.

These stories highlight how our partners are turning shared goals into real outcomes — generating jobs, empowering communities, and moving development forward where it’s needed most.

• From Bangladesh to Nigeria, Civil Society Powers Jobs for the Future 
• Interview with Rose Goslinga, Co-Founder & President of Pula
• Interview with Peter Materu, Chief Program Officer at the Mastercard Foundation 
• The Future of Africa’s Jobs Must Be Inclusive
• Planting Seeds for Jobs, Community, and Resilience in Western Kenya
• Unlocking Youth Employment: An Approach That Works
• Interview with Sara Farley, Vice President, Global Food Portfolio, The Rockefeller Foundation

When we think about jobs and opportunities for young people, one thing is certain: no one can do it alone. As leaders of grassroots initiatives in Nigeria and Bangladesh, we’ve seen that jobs are created when civil society, government, and businesses work side by side with organizations like the World Bank Group. It’s in these partnerships that hope turns into opportunity, and young people find the chance to build their own future.

Rafiu’s perspective: YEDIS in Nigeria

In Nigeria, millions of young people are entering the labor market each year, yet decent jobs remain scarce. When we founded the Youths Enterprise Development and Innovation Society (YEDIS), it was with the conviction that young people themselves—when equipped with the right skills, tools, and networks—can become job creators, not just job seekers.

Our journey has shown that rural entrepreneurship, digital innovation, and agribusiness can be powerful engines of employment. For example, women-led palm oil cooperatives in Osun State were once excluded from formal support. They worked with rudimentary tools, limiting their productivity, and their voices were unheard. With YEDIS, they gained access to training in sustainable processing, digital marketing, and financial management. Their group, once marginalized, became recognized by local authorities, securing modern extraction machinery and new markets. Today, these women are not just workers, they are employers, innovators, and community leaders.

Our digital innovation programs tell a similar story. Through our mentoring efforts, over 20,000 young people have moved from casual social media users to leveraging mobile technology for e-commerce, digital payments, and enterprise development. Some now run online fashion stores, while others have built businesses in logistics and creative design. These ventures contribute to a homegrown digital economy that is increasingly attractive to investors.

But this transformation would not be possible without partnerships. We collaborate with governments, global institutions, and the private sector. We co-create solutions with communities, making sure training is rooted in local realities. We believe civil society’s role is to unlock potential, connect the underserved to opportunities, and advocate for policies that enable entrepreneurship to flourish.

Maahi’s perspective: Shoktikonna in Bangladesh

In Bangladesh, the story is different but echoes the same lesson: jobs require joint action. When we launched Shoktikonna, which means “Power Woman,” we were responding to a glaring gap in the energy sector. Despite its central role in the green transition, the sector was overwhelmingly male-dominated. 

South Asia’s clean energy transition is opening new opportunities, yet women held barely one-third of the jobs in this field, often in administrative positions. If women were excluded from technical and leadership roles, the transition would not be just, inclusive, or sustainable.

Shoktikonna works to break that cycle. Our leadership cohorts combine technical training on renewable energy, e-mobility, and carbon markets with mentorship, networking, and exposure to real projects. Graduates like Puja, Ruthila, and Nishi, who faced gender stereotypes, introversion, or lack of confidence, have emerged as engineers, project coordinators, and advisors at leading organizations. Today, 87 percent of our graduates are working in green energy roles or pursuing higher studies.

One of our proudest achievements is how industry partners have embraced this vision. Companies like Solshare and Grameen Shakti now actively recruit our graduates, not out of charity but because they recognize their talent, skills, and leadership potential. Together with private sector partners, we are co-creating Bangladesh’s first Green Jobs Portal, ensuring young women have direct access to emerging opportunities.

Civil society’s role here is catalytic: we prepare the talent pipeline, nurture confidence, and shift cultural narratives. The private sector then takes the lead in providing jobs and scaling innovation.

Our shared vision: Jobs through partnerships

Civil society brings trust and local insight. The private sector brings markets and scale. Institutions like the World Bank Group bring support. And governments create the conditions for all to flourish. When these forces move together, young people don’t just find work—they find purpose and dignity.

The future of work in our regions depends on this synergy. In Nigeria, it means helping rural entrepreneurs connect digital skills to finance and markets. In Bangladesh, it means ensuring women engineers lead the green transition, shaping the technologies of tomorrow. And everywhere, it means crafting policies rooted in lived experience, making entrepreneurship less risky, innovation more rewarding, and inclusion the norm rather than the exception.

We may be small organizations, but our stories show what’s possible. YEDIS began with just a few young people in underserved communities; today, it has reached tens of thousands. Shoktikonna started with 45 women; today, its graduates are powering Bangladesh’s green economy.

From Nigeria’s cassava fields to Bangladesh’s solar rooftops, the message is clear: when partnerships drive action, jobs follow. And when jobs are inclusive and sustainable, communities rise together.

Since its inception in 2015, IFC-investee Pula has partnered with over 110 insurance and reinsurance companies, and 70 distribution partners across the globe to reach more than 15 million farmers. Agriculture insurance provides farmers with financial protection against production losses caused by natural events, such as drought, excessive rainfall, pests and diseases.

[Sara Haddad, World Bank] Rose, thanks for joining us. Pula uses technology to monitor crops, determine when insurance needs to be paid out. Can you give me an example of how this helps smallholder farmers manage risk and recover from losses?

[Rose Goslinga] I’ve worked with farmers for 18 years, and they face enormous risks — droughts, floods, pests, locusts. Pula now operates across 13 African markets, and we’ve seen how traditional insurance often fails smallholders. While traditional farmer insurance premiums in the U.S. can cost $15,000, smallholders pay $10 for less than a hectare. To serve them sustainably, we rely heavily on technology.

We use satellite data to group farmers by microclimate and detect losses, verified through random farm visits. Local youth use our smartphone app to conduct standardized harvests, creating gig work while giving us accurate yield data.

Each year, we insure about five million farmers and visit around 30,000 farms, employing roughly 1,500 young people. This approach not only makes insurance possible at scale but builds trust, as farmers see someone from their community collecting the data that determines their payouts.

[Sara Haddad, World Bank]  Are you working on developing or looking at any other technology to help smallholders better manage weather-related shocks?

[Rose Goslinga] Definitely. The smallholder farmers risks are evolving— it’s not just droughts or floods, but also crop diseases that wipe out livelihoods. For example, In the cocoa sector, farmers sometimes don’t know whether to cut a tree down or try to save it, and that decision can mean losing two to five years of income while a new tree grows.

New technology like AI and machine vision tools allow a farmer to take a photo of a cocoa tree and quickly see whether it’s healthy or infected. We’re also using blockchain and stablecoin technology to make insurance payouts faster. Because insurance systems are fragmented, transferring funds can take time — these tools help move money securely and quickly so farmers get paid when they need it most. Finally, we focus on scale — innovations must reach millions consistently, not just in pilot projects, to have real impact.

[Sara Haddad, World Bank] Is there one tech innovation that doesn’t exist yet (or isn’t being used with smallholders) that you would like to see developed or applied to help farmers be more productive?

[Rose Goslinga] I think one of the biggest innovations we’ve made recently isn’t just about technology, but about how the whole system works. We started out as an insurtech — designing insurance products and working with governments, banks, and local insurers to help farmers adopt them. When IFC invested in us in 2023, one of the key areas we wanted to build out was a reinsurance company, so we recently started one.

The goal is to really integrate the insurance chain. When you’re using tools like stablecoin to move payouts, you need the whole process — from underwriting to payment — to be connected. By taking on some of that risk ourselves, we have more control and can get payouts to farmers faster.

Innovation isn’t always about inventing new tech; it’s also about streamlining processes so the technology we develop delivers results on the ground efficiently.

[Sara Haddad, World Bank]  With more than 1 billion young people slated to join the workforce in the next decade, how can we improve opportunities for young people in agribusiness?

[Rose Goslinga] Jobs are critical for the agricultural sector. Across Africa, farming is aging, yet there are so many young people who just don’t see a clear, stable way to make a living from it.

What we’ve learned at Pula is that insurance, government systems, and farmer registration all need to work together. Without a good registry, you don’t know who to pay, who’s insured, or who’s eligible for credit. Building these systems creates jobs. In Uganda, we worked with the government to register about 1.5 million coffee farmers, which meant employing 4,500 young people to collect the data, who then found additional work in insurance surveys, claims assessment, and export traceability.

I think digitization will drive the next wave of jobs in agriculture. Farmers need agents to explain digital tools, loans, and insurance. As younger farmers adopt technology, farms become more productive, making agriculture a viable, modern career.

[Sara Haddad, World Bank] What more can partners like the WBG do to spur innovation in the agribusiness sector and help companies like Pula – and smallholders who benefit -- succeed?

[Rose Goslinga] Collaboration across the World Bank Group is critical. But in agriculture, which drives jobs and food security, integration between private sector and government is essential

At Pula, we insure 5 million farmers annually through public-private partnerships (PPPs). In Zambia, about one in three people has our insurance thanks to partnerships with ministries and credit providers.

The World Bank Group can help bridge private investment and government engagement, ensuring innovations reach scale. Agricultural growth relies on strong policy and public-private partnerships. In our case, insurance builds resilience. It doesn’t solve everything, but it’s a tangible step.

Sustained productivity growth can lower food costs, freeing household income and driving broader economic development.

[Sara Haddad, World Bank] Thank you Rose for this conversation.

Peter Materu from the Mastercard Foundation, and Abebe Adugna, Regional Director for Prosperity in Western and Central Africa at the World Bank, discuss financial inclusion, jobs, and digital opportunities for Africa’s youth.

[Abebe Adugna, World Bank] Thank you, Peter, for joining me. Despite years of effort, financial inclusion in Africa remains low—especially among women, young people, and marginalized communities. What are the main barriers holding back progress, and are there examples of partnerships that have helped move the needle?

[Peter Materu] Thank you, Abebe. Africa has made strong progress in financial inclusion, but usage remains shallow and uneven. The biggest constraint is digital infrastructure—many rural areas still lack reliable access, and investment has been slow. Only about 30% of adults have smartphones, limiting access to digital payments, especially for women, who lag men by roughly ten percentage points.

We also need interoperable payment systems so users can move money easily across platforms and new players can compete. Traditional banking barriers persist too: collateral requirements exclude young people and low-income groups. We’re working to change that through risk-sharing facilities and digital credit solutions that make youth lending viable.

At the Mastercard Foundation, inclusion is central to our mission. Since 2018, we’ve committed about $3.4 billion, reaching over 25 million people and unlocking more than $700 million in private investment. We partner with banks like Equity and KCB in Kenya and Absa in Ghana to support young people lending without collateral. In Ethiopia, our partner Kifiya uses digital data to build credit histories, and similar work continues in Uganda with GnuGrid.

We also advance women’s financial inclusion through the Africa Growth Fund, which supports women-led investment funds—helping mobilize capital and change perceptions of Africa as an investment destination.

Finally, our Africa Catalytic Investment Facility (ACIF) supports growth-stage SMEs, complementing our work with smaller enterprises. By demonstrating that African businesses are competitive and investable, we also aim to shift the narrative about Africa’s markets and entrepreneurs. No single actor can solve this alone, but we hope our efforts inspire broader investment in inclusive finance.

[Abebe Adugna, World Bank] Your foundation has set an ambitious goal—enabling 30 million young Africans to access dignified work by 2030. That’s bold and inspiring. What’s your approach to achieving it, and are there scalable models emerging?

[Peter Materu] Yes, we made this commitment in 2018 to push ourselves beyond our comfort zone. So far, we’ve enabled over 19 million young people to access dignified work, and we’re on track for 30 million by 2030. But even that is a fraction of the challenge—by then, over 500 million young Africans will be seeking opportunities. We must act faster while the demographic window is still open.

We focus on three priorities.

First, education—particularly secondary education which we know to be a key pathway to work and technical-vocational training—must align with labor market needs.

Second, skills and employability. Many young people finish school but can’t transition into jobs. We partner with groups like the African Leadership Group to deliver short programs in areas such as cybersecurity, data systems, and AI, directly linking graduates to employers.

Third, moving from projects to programs. Dignified work isn’t a single intervention—it’s a journey from gaining skills to finding and advancing in work. We invest in institutions and address systemic barriers like policy gaps, limited market access, and outdated mindsets.

We also emphasize agency—helping young people believe in their capacity to shape their futures. For those from poor or rural backgrounds, that mindset shift can be transformative.

[Abebe Adugna, World Bank] You’ve emphasized education and skills, but even with talent, many economies lack firms able to hire or grow. Is the main challenge on the supply side—skills and readiness—or the demand side, meaning limited job opportunities?

[Peter Materu] Both are critical, and we try to address them together. We often say: meet young people where they are and travel the journey with them. That begins with relevant education and skilling.

Next is connecting young people to opportunities—linking training directly to employers or entrepreneurship. But the demand side is equally vital: only two or three of every ten young Africans entering adulthood find formal wage employment. So entrepreneurship becomes essential. Most of the 19 million young people we’ve supported found work through self-employment.

To make that sustainable, we partner with banks and use risk-sharing mechanisms so they can lend to young entrepreneurs without collateral. When financial institutions view young people as investable, the entire ecosystem grows—and that’s how jobs are created at scale.

[Abebe Adugna, World Bank] You’ve mentioned digital technology several times. With the digital and AI revolution reshaping the global economy, how do you see its promise and risks in Africa? And how can countries best leverage these tools?

[Peter Materu] I often say digital has become the fourth dimension of basic literacy—essential across all sectors. Whether in finance, agriculture, education, or the creative industries, digital technology is now foundational, and with AI, its importance keeps growing.

The main challenge remains infrastructure—especially in rural areas. Even where it exists, affordability is a barrier; high data and bandwidth costs keep many offline. We also need interoperable systems to connect users across platforms.

Policy frameworks vary by country, but many governments now recognize the urgency of digital transformation. That’s where the World Bank Group can play a key role—supporting infrastructure, expanding access, and creating environments where innovation can thrive.

Ultimately, progress will depend on collaboration among governments, private actors, and development partners to ensure digital benefits reach everyone.

[Abebe Adugna, World Bank] Africa faces a complex development landscape—a growing population, limited jobs, rising debt, and declining aid. How can organizations like the Mastercard Foundation and the World Bank work together more effectively? Are policy or programming shifts needed?

[Peter Materu] By 2050, most of the world’s working-age population will live in Africa. The window to prepare for that future is closing fast—so collaboration is critical.

At the Mastercard Foundation, we aim to scale impact with agility and inclusion. But to meet Africa’s challenges, we need partners with shared purpose, which makes collaboration with the World Bank so valuable.

We’ve already worked together through CGAP, advancing digital payments and inclusion across Africa, and through EdTech, supporting entrepreneurs integrating digital tools into classrooms so young people build digital literacy early.

These partnerships have the potential to be deepened and scaled. With strong leadership and shared purpose, I’m confident we can achieve much more together.

[Abebe Adugna, World Bank] Thank you, Peter. We’d love to continue that conversation, especially around financial inclusion in Kenya, Ghana, and Ethiopia. Let’s plan a follow-up with our teams.

[Peter Materu] Absolutely—it would be a pleasure. I look forward to discussing not just what we can do together, but how. That’s where the real challenge—and opportunity—lies.

A job is more than just a paycheck. It is a pathway to dignity, inclusion, transformation. For Africa’s youth, jobs connect potential to prosperity. But unless we rethink how we design, deliver, and distribute jobs, they will remain out of reach for far too many.

Today, most jobs don’t provide fair income, security, or growth opportunities, according to ACET’s upcoming Job Quality Index.

As we discuss jobs at this year’s Annual Meetings, let’s remember one simple truth: sustainable economic transformation must include everyone.

Every year, 10 to 12 million young Africans enter the labor market. By 2050, Africa will need more than 70 million new jobs annually to meet demand. Currently, only 3.1 million formal jobs are created, leaving millions unemployed or hustling in the informal sector. Even formal jobs often lack adequate pay and benefits.

Too many—especially women, rural youth, and persons with disabilities—have no opportunities at all.

As of 2023, 29.9 million African youth were unemployed, while over 100 million remained underemployed, trapped in precarious or informal work. In some countries, youth unemployment rates exceed 35 percent, fueling instability and migration.

But amid the challenges lie extraordinary opportunities.

Africa will soon be home to the largest workforce in the world. If we invest in the right systems, Africa’s workforce will increasingly underpin global growth in a rapidly aging world.

From Rhetoric to Reform

At ACET, we believe that meaningful reform starts with those systems. Over the past two years, we’ve worked with governments, training institutions, employers, and development partners across Ghana, Rwanda, Uganda, Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, and Niger to reposition technical and vocational education and training (TVET) as a driver of inclusive growth.

What we learned was revealing.

Although more than 600,000 young people are enrolled in TVET institutions across those countries, only one in five is female. Between 70 and 90 percent of most African TVET institutions are public, but countries invest less than 5 percent of their education budgets in them—well below UNESCO’s recommended 10-20 percent.

More troubling, fewer than 15 percent of training programs get input from employers, and less than a quarter of all programs integrate digital or green-economy skills. This despite growing demand for expertise in ICT, clean energy, and climate-smart agriculture.

There are, however, signs of change. Rwanda is piloting national skills councils to align training programs with labor market needs. Ghana is embedding digital and climate skills into its national TVET curriculum. And in Uganda, experienced, informal craftspeople are gaining greater access to certifications.

We also found growing momentum around performance-based financing, where funding to TVET institutions is tied to outcomes, including employment rates, gender equity, and industry partnerships. These policy shifts point to a more responsive, accountable, inclusive ecosystem.  

Inclusion Must Be Intentional

Inclusion doesn’t happen by accident. We must build it into every policy and program.

Today, more than one in four young people in sub-Saharan Africa is not in school, working, or receiving training. Young women and people with disabilities face even greater barriers: limited access to training, safety concerns, and societal expectations. Rural youth often live far from job centers and training opportunities.

Meanwhile, most African workers are employed in the informal sector,  powering our economies but rarely included in formal skills programs or labor plans.

If we want to address the job crisis, we must start with those most often excluded. That means making training flexible, local, and accessible. It means using better data and collaborating with communities, not just institutions.

A Global Moment for Collective Action

As Africa becomes the youngest and fastest-urbanizing region in the world, the urgency to act has never been greater. If Africa’s youth thrive, the world thrives with them, because their future is tied to global progress.

We urge our global partners to invest in African-led reform agendas grounded in evidence, to scale effective programs, and to prioritize equity as a core principle.

ACET remains committed to providing every young African—everyone, everywhere—with a genuine opportunity for a decent, dignified job.

The future of Africa is bright when all are included.

When you plant a seed, you must ensure it gets the nourishment it needs and then trust that it will grow. The same is true for jobs. Seven years ago, when I was 24 years old, I brought together a group of friends from my village in Western Kenya to create Forezava. The youth-led platform provides young people and women with the skills, resources, and opportunities to lead small enterprises that generate income and benefit the community. 

I come from Vihiga County, a predominantly rural area where the realities of getting a decent job are tough and the agriculture we depend on is being threatened by environmental degradation. My background is in education, and as a teacher I would often look around at my students and wonder, how do we help young people stay within their community and create opportunities for themselves here? I wanted to lift up young people’s ideas on what our communities need and to directly benefit the youth involved. For me, it’s about building connections and empowering the next generation to address local problems in their own ways. 

We developed Forezava around a simple piece of advice I once received: just start. If you see a problem or an opportunity in your community, just start. Whatever you can do today, do it today; whatever you can do now, do it now. Over time, knowledge and skills will build, and gradually you’ll find yourself surrounded by an ecosystem of support. 

Forezava is based on trust. We trust young people to understand their community’s needs and to recognize their own strengths. Then, we provide the support they need to implement relevant and practical solutions that create jobs and build resilience. 

One of our programs is the Forezava Community Enterprise Development Initiative, which works with young people like Lavine, who returned home after graduating from a land surveying program. After helping her launch her own start-up, we hosted a community event to introduce local stakeholders to Lavine’s new business and to show how her services as a land surveyor could help them. Another young person we’ve supported is Adika, who wanted to use his small piece of land to generate income but didn’t know where to begin. We helped him see the possibilities and then walked him through the process of registering his own enterprise and opening a bank account. In the three years we’ve been working together, he has transformed his land into a model farm that produces vegetables, bananas, flowers, and seedlings for indigenous and fruit trees. Adika’s business not only sustains his own livelihood but also employs other young people and passes on valuable agricultural knowledge to a new generation. 

Since we started Forezava in 2018, I have seen a big shift in my community. We have trained over 5,000 people, supported 50 youth and women’s groups to establish climate-smart farms, planted more than 100,000 trees, and restored 10 kilometers of riparian land to strengthen food security and resilience. Ten affiliated school clubs are bringing conservation into the classroom, while other Forezava initiatives integrate visual arts, sports, and blockchain technologies to drive innovation and raise environmental awareness. I've seen the young people we've worked with build their own platforms and become independent. 

Forezava shows what’s possible when communities are supported to create their own solutions for the local problems they face. We need to tell more stories about the transformational, yet often simple, ideas and solutions already emerging at the community level. Take, for example, our Seed2Tree project, where we bring young people into the forest to collect indigenous seeds and then plant these at Forezava Farm. Once grown into seedlings, we sell them in the community to simultaneously generate income and regenerate local ecosystems. In our village, this kind of simple, necessary work has been carried out consistently and continuously for generations. 

The opportunities that exist within local communities are immense. Young people are not just full of ideas, they’re already contributing solutions worth investing in.

Employment is one of the most powerful tools to end poverty. Income from a job increases people’s ability to meet daily living needs, build savings, and support their loved ones. 

Yet, despite tens of billions of dollars spent annually by public and social sectors across the world to prepare unemployed youth for workforce entry, employment rates are often low. Changing this disappointing dynamic requires restructuring vocational and workforce programming to focus on employment, not just training alone, and for the duration to span weeks rather than years. This is even more urgent as artificial intelligence (AI) sparks rapid changes in the volume and types of jobs available worldwide.

Generation, the organization I lead, is a global employment nonprofit that trains and places adults into new careers. We work across 40 professions, 17 countries (including in Latin America, Africa, and Asia), and 22,000 employers. Since launching in 2015, we’ve had 142,000 graduates. Over 70 percent of our graduates have secondary or vocational education, half are female, and 88 percent are between the ages of 18 and 29. What’s more, 90 percent of our learners are unemployed when they start our programs, with half of them long-term unemployed.

We’ve seen that most vocational and workforce programs focus mostly on training, with little employer engagement. At Generation, training is only one part of our broader approach to helping unemployed young people access and maintain a living-wage career. Our seven-step methodology starts with mobilizing job vacancies with employers. We then recruit learners and deliver a six-to-16-week profession-specific program that integrates technical and behavioral skills and mindset for the activities our graduates will do on the job. Alongside training, we also offer social support services such as mentorship. After the program’s completion, employers interview our graduates for job placement. We stay engaged with our alumni while they are on the job and foster a sense of community among them.  

We track our graduates’ employment, income, and well-being at regular intervals after the program: at three months, six months, one year, and then annually up to five years.  To date, we’ve collected 57 million data points spanning this timeline. This data helps us understand whether our graduates are experiencing economic mobility for themselves and their families, breaking the intergenerational poverty cycle. Most vocational and workforce programs don’t track medium- and longer-term outcomes, often because they believe it’s difficult and expensive. But this does not have to be the case. At Generation, tracking outcomes over time costs just 1 percent of the total program cost per learner. 

The result? Within three to six months of completing the program, 83 percent of Generation’s graduates are employed. These outcomes are durable over time –- two to five years post-graduation, 76 percent of Generation alumni remain employed, 80 percent of employed alumni can meet their daily living needs, and 73 percent earn above living wage. Our graduates have cumulatively earned $2 billion in wages to date.

We work with ten governments across the world. For example, in India, Generation works with national and state-government entities in a public-private partnership funded by both government and philanthropy. The World Bank co-funded Generation India’s first pilot with the government. This partnership involves changing how training providers are reimbursed by the government, as well as supporting existing training providers to deliver Generation’s seven-step process. As a result, training providers have seen employment rates increase from 25 percent to more than 80 percent within months. 

We believe that public and social sector partners could achieve greater employment and income gains for youth by redeploying existing resources toward holistic and data-tracked programming.  This is especially important now with AI’s growing impact on the labor market in middle-income countries, where entry-level job vacancies in living-wage professions are already declining. For example, in our Latin American countries, entry-level tech job vacancies have fallen by 33 percent since early 2025 (Talent Neuron). In India, entry-level tech job vacancies dropped by 42 percent between Q4 2024 to date, and entry-level sales roles have fallen by 45 percent in 2025. 

Jobs alone won’t end poverty. Vocational and workforce programs must equip youth with the right skills and the support needed to secure lasting employment.

We interview Sara Farley of the Rockefeller Foundation on the challenges and innovations shaping the future of agriculture, jobs, and food systems in a rapidly changing world.

[Xavier Muller, World Bank] Thank you for joining us today, Sara. What opportunities and challenges do you see in the agriculture and food sector? And are there innovations you’re especially hopeful about that could create more opportunities for smallholder farmers?

[Sara Farley] We’re facing major challenges in the global food system. Agriculture produces about one-third of global greenhouse gases, and even if other sectors meet their targets, we’d still struggle to meet the Paris 1.5°C goal without transforming food production. The system drives 86% of global species loss, mainly through land conversion and deforestation, and uses roughly 75% of freshwater. Poor diets are now the leading cause of preventable death.

We need a food system that’s productive and inclusive for the 1.5 billion smallholder farmers — rewarding practices that store carbon, restore biodiversity, conserve water, and build resilience against droughts, floods, and erratic weather.

Regenerative or agroecological farming builds on traditional ecological knowledge and offers multiple benefits. In India’s Andhra Pradesh, one million farmers practice community-managed natural farming, improving incomes, nutrition, and soil health. In Brazil, school procurement policies support smallholder agroecological farmers, providing reliable market pull. Together, these examples show that it’s possible to align farming with climate goals, restore ecosystems, and strengthen livelihoods at the same time.

[Xavier Muller, World Bank] Let’s pivot to jobs. At the World Bank, our focus is on creating more and better employment opportunities. How can countries modernize their farming sectors to generate jobs?

[Sara Farley] There’s a huge opportunity for new kinds of jobs if we shift from business-as-usual, chemical-dependent farming toward agriculture that restores nature and strengthens resilience. That transition requires a major knowledge upgrade — the skills farmers use today aren’t the same ones needed for regenerative agriculture. It’s a more knowledge-intensive system, and where there’s new knowledge, there are new jobs.

We’re also seeing rapid growth in jobs related to monitoring, reporting, and verification — people who test soils, assess species diversity, and track forest cover. Technology, including AI and satellite imagery, can help, but we’ll still need people on the ground for verification and for ensuring traceability from seed to fork or plate.

So really, when you zoom out, the story of ecological agriculture is one of more labor-abundant agriculture, at least in the short to medium term — creating meaningful work while regenerating land, water, and livelihoods.

[Xavier Muller, World Bank] How can philanthropic capital help de-risk investments in agriculture and attract more private and institutional capital?

[Sara Farley] No single foundation can finance the shift from fossil-fuel-dependent, extractive agriculture to one that restores biodiversity, water security, and soil health. The scale is immense — $250–430 billion a year for a decade, or roughly $4 trillion total.

To meet that challenge, philanthropy must evolve from funding isolated projects to what we call systemic investing. This means viewing the entire system — policy, infrastructure, inputs, technical assistance, markets — and coordinating across funders so each fills a complementary lane.

In Kenya and Tanzania, over 30 philanthropies, private investors, and multilateral partners mapped county-level investment needs. In Murang’a County, they identified gaps in policy, infrastructure, research, and farmer support. Each partner is now taking responsibility for a piece — Rockefeller, for example, is investing in systems to verify and reward regenerative production, while others focus on research or financing tools.

They’re also designing a financial orchestrator to align capital, structure deals, and coordinate complex instruments like guarantees or insurance. This collaborative, systemic, blended approach is the only viable path to transform agriculture at scale.

[Xavier Muller, World Bank] Could you tell us more about collaborating with the World Bank Group and other partners to advance agriculture and food security? How can we make these partnerships more effective?

[Sara Farley] We’ve been exploring financing that connects both supply and demand sides of food systems. Investments often focus on either farmer readiness or nutrition, not both. Real transformation requires both.

We partnered with analytic organizations to explore financing that links regenerative production with market demand, especially through public procurement and school meals. At a Bellagio convening, we worked with World Bank agriculture and social protection teams, plus ministries of finance from Africa and Asia, to develop country roadmaps for Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Indonesia. These outline steps to align philanthropic, multilateral, bilateral, and private capital for systemic investment.

This collaboration continues, including sessions at the World Bank Annual Meetings. Critical to success is building trust and coordination among funders before engaging governments — ensuring instruments like first-loss guarantees, social impact bonds, or blended finance are understood and actionable.

What excites me most is that the World Bank engages across multiple areas — agriculture, social protection, and beyond — recognizing that food systems transformation is inherently cross-sectoral. It’s a learning journey for all of us, showing real promise.