Facilitation tools to enhance the alignment of scientific technical assistance with agribusinesses and create buy-in among key stakeholders: Communication framework

Effective agribusiness support requires bridging gaps between scientists and companies while addressing two major challenges: scientists’ limited understanding of business realities and the lack of stakeholder alignment within agribusinesses. To improve scientist-company collaboration, we created a mutual interview protocol that fosters efficient, productive discussions and informs future matchmaking. Simultaneously, we developed a communication framework to help companies present scientific insights effectively to key stakeholders, ensuring alignment and securing financial support. These tools aim to improve the adoption of technical assistance, scale CGIAR innovations, and enhance the impact of agribusiness support programs.

A pressing challenge lies in the communication and adoption of technical assistance by agribusiness stakeholders. Agribusinesses are often guided by funders and board members who may not fully understand or appreciate the technical recommendations—particularly when those insights suggest transformative strategic shifts, such as changes in supply chain management or new product development. Even when the initial scientist-company collaboration succeeds, these relationships can falter if the company cannot secure financial support for sustained engagement or if stakeholders feel threatened by the proposed innovations. Paradoxically, the most groundbreaking innovations often generate the greatest resistance.

To address this issue, we developed a communication framework enabling companies and scientists to package insights effectively and present them to key stakeholders, including executives, boards, and investors. This tool, currently in early testing with agribusinesses and impact investors in the Nairobi market, takes the form of report template as well as a slide deck template designed to integrate scientific insights into a company’s strategic narrative. The goal is to achieve three levels of buy-in: from company executives, board members, and external investors or grant funders who can support and de-risk scaling CGIAR innovations. By incorporating this communication framework into companies’ investor pitch decks, we hope to enable more effective adoption of scientific insights and foster long-term collaboration.
In addition to these tools, solving discrete problems, we also developed an Accelerator Playbook to guide organizations on the development of programs.