Winrock International’s 2026-2028 strategic plan: A letter from President and CEO Maqsoda Maqsodi
Dear Friends and Partners:
Today I am honored and excited to announce Winrock’s 2026-28 strategic plan.
It’s a three-year roadmap that positions Winrock to build on strengths cultivated over four decades of learning with and from our community partners, from expertise gleaned over years of gathering and studying evidence, from innovating and adapting.
I’d like to share a few key pieces of it with you here.
Rooted in our legacy, focused on our future
At the heart of our strategic plan is a simple but critical goal: To increase the resilience of rural communities and the environmental ecosystems they depend on.
Communities everywhere, from the U.S. Delta and Midwest to West Africa and South and Southeast Asia — regions where Winrock has worked extensively and where we’ve maintained lasting, equitable partnerships — face intensifying economic shocks and climate pressures.
They also hold extraordinary potential for innovation and durable change.
Many of our projects and programs over the decades have focused on sustainable, regenerative agriculture practices – with markets and rural livelihoods front-of-mind – as well as on multi-stakeholder initiatives that protect environmental ecosystems.
Looking ahead to the next three years, our focus will sharpen around these elemental areas – agriculture and environmental ecosystems. They are where we see both the greatest continued need, and the greatest opportunity for lasting progress.
A new theory of change
Our strategic plan is anchored by our new theory of change, which is this: Rural communities face elevated risks of economic and climate shocks. To enable them and their environmental ecosystems to prosper, Winrock will:
- Center community voices to drive systems-level change;
- Prove and scale solutions for agriculture and environmental ecosystems; and
- Partner with communities to design solutions that strengthen those systems.
As we endeavor to turn our theory into measurable, sustainable impact, we will continue our best-in-class work safeguarding human rights, notably in preventing human trafficking and child labor, and grow our efforts to support ethical and sustainable supply chains in agriculture, critical minerals and other natural resources. We believe that strengthening social safeguards for communities – especially those most vulnerable to shocks – is foundational to building resilience and prosperity.
A new way of operating
This plan marks a significant evolution in how Winrock operates.
In the wake of dramatic shifts in traditional funding sources, we are embracing a more diverse, sustainable business model — one that strengthens our potential to continue achieving systems-level impact while securing our viability. We’re actively deepening and building new partnerships with philanthropies, and expanding our cutting-edge, fee-for-service work with responsible businesses focused on regenerative agriculture, climate, ecosystems and ethical supply chains.
We’re also building relationships with individuals and families who share our dedication to rural communities. We will continue to collaborate with other mission-aligned funders and partners, including with governments and multilaterals keen to move the needle in our focal areas.
And we are investing in new operating capabilities — including ethical use of AI, data, tech and advisory services — to meet growing, global demands for high-integrity, evidence-driven agricultural and environmental solutions.
Building from a foundation of strength
Our new strategy requires evolution. Like any meaningful change, it will take time. But our path ahead is clear, and the purpose behind it is strong. Around the world, Winrock teams are already proving what resilient solutions look like. Just a few examples:
- Our work with communities and partners globally has resulted in 4 million acres of cropland cultivated with improved, climate-smart technologies that strengthen livelihoods and environmental health.
- Our technical advisory services provided to governments worldwide have facilitated conservation of more than 494 million acres of tropical forests.
- Over the last decade, Winrock helped keep 2.8 million workers and children out of exploitative labor — including in agriculture supply chains — and provided services to more than 30,000 survivors of human trafficking and other forms of exploitation.
From upheaval to possibility
To me, this moment feels like we are turning a page toward a new possibility; one shaped by the people and communities who best know their own challenges, opportunities and potential.
As we roll out our 2026–2028 strategic plan, I invite you — our funders, friends, committed public- and private sector partners, and the communities we proudly serve — to join us in shaping a world where we can thrive, together. And I thank you for walking this path with us.
Winrock’s mission of empowering the disadvantaged, increasing economic opportunity, and sustaining natural resources has never been more critical than it is now. I believe our founder, Governor Winthrop Rockefeller, would agree with that.
And then, I think, he’d ask us to roll up our sleeves and get to work.
With determination and gratitude,
Maqsoda Maqsodi