We are pleased to announce that two MILEAD Fellows, Gloria Mangi (Tanzania) and Patience Atim (Cameroon) have been shortlisted to receive the World Youth Summit Award. The WSYA is an annual award and a network for young people, under 30 years of age, using the Internet, mobile phones or other digital media to put the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) into action. TheAfrican Queens Project and Agro-Hub Cooperative are among 60 projects shortlisted for the final award!
The African Queens Project, nominated under the Power 2 Women category of the competition, was established by Miss Mangi as a platform to share the struggles, triumphs, and victories of African women who are making a difference in the continent. The project seeks to inspire and motivate young women who want to do something in their community and their nations, through stories from the women featured on the website (http://africanqueensproject.com/ ). Miss Mangi wants the African Queens Project to be “the go to place for women of all ages so that they can see that they are not alone and that the impossible is possible.”
Miss Atim’s Agro-Hub Cooperative aims at alleviating poverty among rural farmers in Cameroon and bringing about an increase in their household income by providing them with access to better markets through the setting up of market structures and the provision of basic ICT tools to share information. The project is taking giant strides to make Cameroon’s agricultural sector more attractive and present it as a lucrative business, especially to young people who are turning away from agriculture in search of better paying jobs in the urban cities under the pretext that it is strenuous and not profitable. Agro-Hub Cooperative (http://agro-hub.com/ ) was nominated under the Fight Poverty, Hunger and Disease category of the competition.
The creator of the successful project will win a trip to Colombo for the WSYA Winners’ Event 2013, October 24-26. This prize offers more than just an opportunity to explore the biggest city of the tropical island with its aquamarine waters and pristine shores. At one of the globally most important events for young ICT-developers, the next generation of IT-pioneers will have the chance to present their project in front of a high-level audience, including business leaders from the multimedia sector and creative industry, representatives of politics and NGOs and many more.
Moremi Initiative is proud to see its Fellows transform their promises into action in a bid to create the positive change we wish to see on the African continent. We wish our Fellows the best of luck as they proceed to the next stage of the competition.
Congratulations Gloria and Patience!