By Kemo Cham
A team of young innovators from Kenema have been adjudged winner of the top prize in the maiden edition of the Social Equity Programme National Afinnovate Youth Challenge in Sierra Leone.
‘Team Kenema Water Supply’, as their project is called, designed a revolutionary, durable, affordable and sustainable solar-powered water pump that enables farmers to pump water directly from the earth to the field with the potential to increase their productivity. The team of six youngsters is one of 10 groups that emerged from among over 3,000 budding innovators who participated in a year-long initiative implemented by the Center for Advocacy and Sustainable Empowerment Sierra Leone (CASE SALONE), with funding and technical support from the Z Zurich Foundation through the Ghana-based Junior Achievement Africa. It’s part of a continent-wide initiative with the primary goal of equipping young people for self-reliance.
The project, which targets youth age 16 to 25, took the form of bootcamps and mentorship on entrepreneurship, leadership, innovation and mental wellbeing skills, with the beneficiaries trained on basic skills of starting and running a business.
CASE SALONE worked with a group of 16 partner organizations as co-implementers of the project, conducting a total of 15 four-day bootcamps for participants drawn from the four regions of the country. The bootcamps were held in the regional capitals of Bo, Makeni and Kenema, as well as in Freetown. The participants then underwent an eight week-long online coaching and mentorship sessions, climaxing with a regional pitching competition, from which the 10 finalists emerged.
CASE Salone said the project aims to address unemployment and drug abuse among youth, and build more social innovators who will serve as catalysts of change and influence job creation, contributing to the Sierra Leone government’s Big Five Game Changer development plan, as well as the global Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations.
Ibrahim Mansaray, the Social Equity Programme Lead at CASE SALONE, a community-based organization operating in the southern district of Bo, said the initiative offered a “big opportunity” for all young people across the country.
“We want to awaken the creative minds in innovations among our young people, and tap into them to enable them to not just capacitate themselves but also to contribute to community and national development,” he said.
All 10 finalists that emerged from the regional pitching competition received seed grants of USD500 each. In addition, as the top prize winner, Team Kenema Water Supply went home with USD3,000 after the final pitching held in Bo on Saturday 27th September. They will also represent Sierra Leone at an international competition scheduled for October 31st, with the opportunity to win the ultimate prize of USD5,000.
Jacob Sahr Yajo, Team Lead for Team Kenema, expressed delight at the breakthrough of his team.
“I am overjoyed,” he told ManoReporters.
Yajo showered praises on organizations like Network Empowerment for Young Generation Sierra Leone (NEYG – SL) and the Children Forum Network for the technical support provided, and CASE SALONE and its partners for the opportunity to participate in the competition.
The runner-up, Team Eco Twist Green Generation, designed a technology that transforms plastic waste into beautifully hand-made craft and Sierra Leonean fabrics like bags, prayer mats, clothes, and frames. And for this, they went home with USD2,000 as the second prize. Second runner-up, Team Eco Circula, took home with them USD1,000 as the third prize, for their technology that transforms plastic waste into durable bricks for construction.
The other seven finalists are Team Cap Flop, whose innovation transforms cassava into varieties of nutritious food with the aim of increasing food production and potentially reducing reliance on imported foods; Team Tech and Innovation worked on a technology that promotes safety and security for local farmers through a device that monitors and detects movement and trigger alarms to notify farmers of intruders and wild animals; Team Crop Care Salone’s solar powered cold storage facility preserves harvested fruits and vegetables; Team Establish the Needful created a powerful solar light book that turns sunlight into study time; Team Agro Innovation transforms kitchen waste into rich organic manure, thereby increasing the chances of local farmers to produce two to three times a year; Team Plantain Mix produces nutritious, affordable and accessible baby food using local and nutritious ingredients like Plantain, Fish, Beans and Bennie Seed; Team Achievers transforms cartons and plastic waste into beautiful decor and wall frames.
Ousman Shero Kamara, Deputy Director at Elevate Afric Innovation, one of 16 collaborators of CASE Salone in the project, said initiatives like this are what Sierra Leone needs to lift itself from its current situation.
“What we need now is not much of formal education, we need these skills that will place us on the path to progress,” he said.
Saturday’s final pitching competition held in Bo brought together all partners of CASE Salone, both locally and internationally.
Remijus N. Iweobi, Programme Officer for Global Fund for Children in Liberia, a partner of CASE SALONE, said the Social Equity Programme is a testament of the real impact that civll society organizations and NGOs can make in powering young people with the skills, the knowledge and the resources that they need to lead the change and develop their countries.
“NGOs would not change the world. What can develop a country is businesses, is entrepreneurship, and we need NGOs to empower young people to go into entrepreneurship ventures and businesses that challenge and solve the issues that we are facing using the resources that we have,” he said.
Paschal Fellah, a board member at CASE Salone, urged the finalists to think development beyond academic education by embracing digital media in seeking solutions to community problems.
“In the job market, they do not look for how much books you have read, rather, they look at your professional experience. So you have to be creative in whatever you do,” he said.
