Make It Grow

Make It Grow is a University of Sheffield CROSS Catalyst award winning (consultancy-based) social enterprise. It is affiliated to the Institute for Sustainable Food, University of Sheffield and was supported by the UKRI's Economic and Social Research Council. We support community-based, sustainable food initiatives to build capacity and create video proposals, in order to attract start-up (including crowd-sourced) funds and small grants. In the face of today’s multifaceted global challenges, community-based food initiatives are becoming increasingly important. It is important to acknowledge that great ideas for low-cost and dynamic solutions to food insecurity are often already present at the local grassroots level. However, community-based initiatives often have the least access to funding and the least capacity to develop funding proposals. With access to the means of both generating and sharing video becoming ever more prevalent, it is important that organisations adapt grant-giving processes so that digital video can be mobilised in ways that enhance the accessibility of funding and give greater space to local initiatives and community voice. At the same time, it is also critical that community-based organisations build their own capacity to harness the power of video and related ICTs, to communicate their ideas and thus, become more capable of attracting start-up funds.