Picture of the workshop attendees standing outside the UCT School of Economics building
GreenFi (green financing) project workshop attendees. Photo: EfD South Africa

EfD South Africa hosts workshop on green financing for agrifood businesses

EPRU successfully hosted its first GreenFi PhD workshop, which brought together three doctoral students and three project leaders and administrators from the Danish Institute for Internationale Studier (DIIS) and EPRU.

The 3-day workshop, which took place in April, provided an opportunity to orientate participating PhD students, refine emerging research ideas, strengthen collaborative engagement, and chart the direction of the project for the years ahead.

Promoting cost-effective learning

The workshop was held at EPRU to promote interactive and cost-effective learning. The workshop focused on academic development, project planning, mentorship, and team-building activities to support the next generation of researchers working at the intersection of green finance, climate resilience, and agrifood systems.

GreenFi helps understand SMEs

The GreenFi project investigates how and to what extent South African agrifood small and medium-sized enterprises, SMEs, access green financing and how this influences their climate responsiveness. This research is split into three packages, that focus on specific areas of the research. The first examines how South African state and non-state actors engage with emerging global norms in green financing. The second work package analyses what factors influence agrifood SMEs’ access to green financing, and how this shapes their financing mix between green and non-green financing. The final work package looks at how an agrifood SME’s climate responsiveness is influenced by its share of green financing.

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News | 18 June 2026