The Aga Khan Foundation, the United Kingdom and Switzerland are combining entrepreneurship programs across Central Asia in an effort to support more than 2,000 entrepreneurs, create more than 5,000 jobs and unlock $17 million in private investment.
Implemented through Accelerate Prosperity, an initiative of the Aga Khan Development Network, the collaboration covers the Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan and focuses on businesses that can contribute to greener and more inclusive economic growth.
Rather than creating an entirely new development program, the partnership coordinates two existing initiatives: the UK’s Green Inclusive Growth Business Development Services program and Switzerland’s Supporting Accelerated Growth of Entrepreneurship, or SAGE, Phase II.
That distinction matters because the collaboration is designed to connect business support, investment readiness and private capital across three markets rather than operate as a short-term startup competition or innovation campaign.
Switzerland’s SAGE Program Runs Through 2029
Switzerland’s SAGE Phase II provides one of the longer-term foundations for the partnership.
According to the Swiss government’s SAGE Phase II project record, the program runs from May 2025 through December 2029 and is implemented by Accelerate Prosperity.
Its objective is to promote climate-resilient and inclusive private-sector investment and job creation in Central Asia.
That mandate extends the initiative beyond conventional startup acceleration. Climate resilience becomes part of the economic-development strategy, while job creation and private investment provide measurable outcomes against which the program can eventually be assessed.
Accelerate Prosperity’s role is particularly relevant because its model combines entrepreneurial support with access to financing.
Young companies in emerging markets can face a gap between learning how to build a viable business and obtaining the patient capital required to expand it. Combining business-development services with investment mechanisms is intended to address both constraints.
The UK Is Building a Wider Green-Growth Financing Program
The British component sits within the UK-Central Asia Green Inclusive Growth Fund.
The UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s Green Inclusive Growth Fund records show a formal development program supported by a business case, implementation documents, grants and a results framework.
For entrepreneurs, the practical component is business-development support intended to strengthen companies and expand the pipeline of businesses capable of attracting investment. The regional approach is important.
Entrepreneurs in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan operate in different markets and regulatory environments, but many face common constraints involving access to finance, management expertise, technology, markets and investment networks.
The partnership aims to coordinate support across those markets rather than operate the UK and Swiss programs as unrelated interventions.
Women and Young Entrepreneurs Are a Priority
The collaboration places particular emphasis on women and young entrepreneurs.
That focus matters because job creation is only one measure of whether startup programs produce inclusive economic growth. Who can start companies, receive business support and access investment determines how widely the economic benefits are distributed. The initiative also extends support beyond conventional technology startups.
Climate-smart businesses can emerge in agriculture, energy, resource efficiency, manufacturing and other sectors where environmental improvements and commercial development overlap.
That broader definition is especially relevant in Central Asia, where climate resilience is closely connected with water, agriculture, energy and local economic development.
Examples from other emerging markets show how environmental innovation can also become an investable business model. Gignomist’s reporting on BleagLee’s use of AI to turn waste into industrial materials illustrates how a climate-related company can combine technology, waste recovery, manufacturing and job creation.
From Entrepreneur Support to Investment
The Central Asian strategy became more concrete during 2026.
Accelerate Prosperity subsequently outlined plans for AP Astana, a regional investment facility with an initial size of approximately $20 million and an ambition to catalyze another $50 million for startups and small and growing businesses by 2031.
The facility is associated with the UK’s Green Inclusive Growth framework and adds a financing layer to the entrepreneurship-support strategy.
Gignomist’s later report on Accelerate Prosperity’s $20 million Central Asia startup fund also shows how the organization is combining climate-focused finance with data and AI-enabled approaches to founder support.
That later development helps put the original AKF-UK-Swiss partnership into perspective.
The 2025 collaboration was not simply an event marking cooperation between development organizations. It formed part of a longer effort to build an entrepreneurship and investment pipeline across Central Asia.
The Targets Now Provide a Test of Execution
The partnership’s headline goals are ambitious: more than 2,000 entrepreneurs supported, more than 5,000 jobs created and $17 million in private investment unlocked.
Those figures should be understood as program targets, not outcomes already achieved. That distinction will become increasingly important as implementation continues.
The useful measure of the initiative will not be how many workshops or startup events it holds, but whether supported businesses become commercially sustainable, attract outside capital and create durable employment — particularly for women and younger workers.
SAGE Phase II’s timeline through the end of 2029 provides several years in which those results can be measured.
Accelerate Prosperity’s emerging investment facilities add another test: whether business-development programs can produce enough investable companies to turn public and development-sector support into larger flows of private capital.
If that happens, the partnership could provide a model for connecting climate resilience with entrepreneurship in markets where conventional venture capital remains limited.
For now, its importance lies in something more measurable than a broad promise of “green innovation”: three countries, two coordinated government-backed programs, explicit employment and investment targets, and a multi-year framework in which those targets can eventually be tested.
