Deadline: 14 November 2018
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is seeking proposals for the 22nd Round of the Grand Challenges Exploration on the topic of “Innovation for WASH in Urban Settings”.
GCE seeks digital technology-based solutions that promote access to essential resources and services (clean water, sanitation) and can make a difference in reducing morbidity and mortality to promote healthy, safe, and productive lives. GCE know that technology does not automatically or inevitably improve people’s lives; creative solutions must be contextually grounded and designed in response to on-the-ground needs of women, children, and families living in challenging urban environments.
Ideal solutions may target individuals, families, communities, urban planners, service providers, or WASH/ food infrastructure, networks, and systems. Solutions may include but are not limited to: services, models, or tools intended to improve overall access to WASH services and that apply a deeper understanding of users’ (customers/providers) needs when designing programs, services, and products/interventions. GCE seeks solutions that are interactive, contextual, scalable, and relevant to WASH systems strengthening. GCE is specifically interested in work targeting: clean drinking water, household sanitation and hygiene, and urban pollution.
Priorities
- Address current inequities in access to WASH needs
- Prioritize marginalized populations, considering specifically those marginalized by their physical/intellectual disability, economic status, race, ethnicity, religion, age, marital status, gender, caste, sexuality, profession, location, literacy or lack thereof, and access to media and communications
- Address a diverse geographic range of urban environments (GCE hope to select solutions from different regions)
- Consider UNICEF Office of Innovation’s Design Principles:
- Design with the User
- Understand the existing ecosystem
- Design for scale
- Build for sustainability
- Be data driven
- Use open standards, open data, open source, open innovation (*if/where possible)
- Reuse and improve
- Do no harm
- Be collaborative
Funding Information
Awards of $100,000 USD are made in Phase I. Phase I awardees have one opportunity to apply for a follow-on Phase II award of up to $1,000,000 USD.
Eligibility Criteria
GCE is open to both foreign and domestic organizations, including non-profit organizations, for-profit companies, international organizations, government agencies, and academic institutions.
How to Apply
Applicants can apply online via given website.
For more information, please visit Grand Challenges Explorations.
