Tackling Marine Plastics in Sub-Saharan Africa

Deadline: 15-Sep-21

The Afri-Plastics Challenge is seeking proposals for Tackling marine plastics in Sub-Saharan Africa – The fight against marine plastic waste in Sub-Saharan Africa.

The Challenge aims to reduce marine plastics in Sub-Saharan African countries by developing and scaling innovative solutions to plastic mismanagement. It involves a public competition that will reward the best solutions to addressing marine plastic litter in developing countries in a way that promotes gender equality and empowerment of women and girls.

The Challenge will help communities throughout Sub-Saharan Africa to prevent plastic waste from entering the marine environment by finding ways to minimize reliance on plastic, new ways of managing plastic waste, and/or new uses for plastic that has been discarded.

Nesta Challenges, in partnership with the Government of Canada, is seeking new innovative solutions to help stop plastic pollution across sub-Saharan Africa. They are launching the CA$14.5 million Afri-Plastics Challenge.

The Problem

Over the past years, demand for plastic has substantially increased in Sub-Saharan Africa and it is projected to follow the same trajectory over the next decades
Indicating a growth of 375% in Sub-Saharan Africa and Middle East and North Africa together
Compared to a global average of 210% by 2060

Areas of opportunity for Innovation

Afri-Plastics Challenge i looking for existing solutions to improve plastic waste management that can be scaled throughout the duration of the Prize. Examples of a few of the types of organisations that may be interested in applying and scaling their businesses include; small-medium scale recyclers, waste picking organisations, waste management enterprises or small-medium buy-back centres.
The two main strategies for mitigating plastic leakages at the downstream level include improved and intensified waste collection, and recycling – actions within these two dimensions are highly interdependent.

Eligibility Criteria

Applicants must be formally constituted and operating in Sub-Saharan Africa as either a registered business or non-governmental organisation (NGO). Applicants can be a single entity, an African partnership or an international partnership. For partnership applications, the nominated lead applicant must be operating in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Applicants can be a single entity, an African partnership or an international partnership. For partnership applications, the nominated lead applicant must be operating in Sub-Saharan Africa.
You can submit up to three ideas and be named as a partner on more than one entry. Each idea must be submitted separately and need to be different from the other ideas you have already submitted.

For more information, visit https://afri-plastics.challenges.org/