Origin Research and Innovation Labs invites youth innovators for impactful problem proposals addressing local communities and aligning with the UN Sustainable Development Goals. This call is open to under-35 years’ student & youth solvers, ideas with African replication potential are encouraged. Submit 2-page proposals by 30th April. Five winners receive $1000 and recognition. Winners will be revealed on 30th May, 2024.

Description of the Challenge

Origin is designed to quickly help institutions design solutions to development challenges that can be deployed on a grand scale to induce continuous changes in product, process, and market innovations which ultimately leads to increased research and development capability and investment. This is a first step towards building a sustainable and inclusive innovation ecosystem that supports both wealthier and poorer communities, formal and informal firms, and established and emerging entrepreneurs.

“Origin’s vision is to help make Africa a global focal point on breakthrough research, development, and problem-solving expertise and excellence. Origin would serve as an institution and a platform for bringing the smartest people in the world to view Africa as a destination for research and for solving wicked problems- the place for raising exciting and intriguing research and innovation questions that attract the interest of smart and talented experts. As such, the mission of Origin is to bring the best of Africa together to solve the complex, wicked problems on the continent by building and propagating ground-breaking, revolutionary solutions that elevate Africa’s people.

About the Community Development Challenge Call

What is a community development challenge? There are multitudes of developmental challenges faced by communities anywhere in the world. This call is targeting challenges that ‘communities’ are facing – not individuals- in all walks of life. Communities here may refer to farmers, processors, fishermen, village, small city, unplanned settlement or special group (e.g., youth, women, students, aged etc. Thus, any solution developed is likely to impact the community and not just one entity. For instance, a community of fish farmers are actively looking for safe and effective ways of cleaning the bottom of the pod, river, lake or sea to reduce infections.

The Community Development Challenges that are inspiring and interesting are also likely to attract potential partners and knowledge providers which increases the opportunity that a viable solution may be developed.  Call brings together a large pool of global scientists, experts, innovators and entrepreneurs to propose feasible solutions to scientific, technological and industrial challenges faced by public and private communities. 

Submit the challenge that a community you know is actively seeking to solve or overcome. The challenges may be related to:

a)     Enhancing the processing and production (e.g. food processing),

b)    Improving the quality of life of people (e.g. access to safe water, clean energy etc)

c)     Improving quality of community services (e.g. to education, health services etc),

d)    Overcoming regulatory requirements such as safety standards, land use and environmental issues, among others. 

This is a Challenge Call. Please do not submit solutions: this is not a call for innovations and/or solutions that you have developed. Instead, submit the challenges that you and partners face for which the community is actively seeking a solution. This is not an entrepreneurship or a research challenge and thus do not submit challenge related to business plans, research funding, setting up, management, viability etc. 

The Process

All challenges received will be evaluated on basis of clarity and ease of interpretation for solution by third parties, relevance to the subjects of focus, potential impact and scalability. For the best submissions Origin and partners will arrange for solution of the challenge by Origin solvers and subsequent implementation.   

Eligibility criteria

The call is limited to students and youths who are registered as solvers on the Origin platform. Beyond these generalities, the following criteria need to be met:

1. The entity submitting the challenge must know the community facing the challenge or the challenge owner (e.g. an NGO/government agency) actively looking for a solutions (e.g. SMEs) or directly facing the challenge (e.g. NGO in its current work with a community).

2.   For this call, only technological challenges will be accepted. Non-technological challenges (e.g. organizational, institutional and managerial arrangements) are outside the current scope of work of Origin.

3.   You should define the basic parameter such as affordability of the solution, size of the community and other items the solution providers may need to consider

4.     The community facing the challenge should be at least three (3) years old – be it formal or informal.

Closing date: 12th May, 2024 (Extended)

Date of announcement of winners: 30th May, 2024