PISA Hearts Humanitarian Foundation Deploys Smart-Agro Innovation to Address Nigeria's Deepening Food Crisis

Nigeria faces one of its most severe food crises in decades, with 30.6 million people projected to experience acute food and nutrition insecurity between June and August 2025 according to the FAO's Cadre Harmonisé. The crisis stems from multiple factors including prolonged conflict in the northeast, banditry and displacement in the northwest, erratic rainfall and droughts linked to climate change, and inflation that continues to push basic food commodities beyond the reach of millions.

Smallholder cooperatives, which produce more than 70 percent of Nigeria's food, represent the backbone of national food supply but remain underfunded and structurally fragile. These cooperatives are essential for pooling resources, accessing capital, and creating bargaining power, yet they cannot thrive without proper investment according to development specialists working in northern agricultural hubs.

The PISA Hearts Humanitarian Foundation is addressing this challenge through its Smart-Agro Innovation (SAI) project, an initiative designed to fuse agriculture, technology, and human capital development in Nigeria's poorest communities. The foundation aims to reach 10,000 smallholder farmers and vulnerable households by December 2026 through a comprehensive support compact that includes family primary healthcare coverage, modern agronomic training, access to finance and digital financial inclusion, smart-agriculture policy advocacy, climate resilience strategies, and market linkage and aggregation structures.

To fully scale the program across three states, PISA estimates it will require $25 million in funding from global donors, development partners, and impact investors. The foundation's vision focuses on restoring dignity to rural households, improving food production, and creating pathways out of poverty. Their model centers on a three-pronged approach: financial inclusion for cooperative members through grant and loan systems, capacity building in climate-smart agriculture and cooperative leadership, and market linkages connecting rural farmers to processors, aggregators and off-takers.

The foundation emphasizes that working with organized groups rather than individuals creates multiplier effects where every dollar invested strengthens entire communities. This approach offers global investors high-impact scalability through cooperative clusters, sustainability through capacity building and financial inclusion, policy influence through structured dialogue with state governments, and visibility through co-branded success reports and impact stories.

PISA is inviting global organizations to co-sponsor an expanded pilot in states including Delta, Nasarawa, Ondo, and Kaduna. The foundation provides detailed project blueprints, impact and monitoring frameworks, state-by-state budget estimates, and customizable partnership models aligned with donor priorities. More information about their initiatives can be found at https://www.princeighosadjerefoundation.org. As Nigeria approaches another lean season, the opportunity exists for investors seeking measurable impact in one of Africa's most consequential development challenges.