The African Innovation Foundation has extended the application deadline for the $250K Innovation Prize for Africa (IPA) 2014 to November 30 in a move to mobilize more African innovators and entrepreneurs to deliver market-oriented solutions for Africa.
The announcement was made in Nigeria by IPA Pauline Mujawamariya, IPA Program Director in a response to the requests received from many countries indicating that their innovators learned about the competition a little late and would need more time to effectively prepare and submit their entries.
Just 1350 applications have been received from 48 countries.
Mujawamariya said, “Africa has experienced one of the fastest economic growths in recent history – 6 per cent on average. Innovation has and will continue to play a vital role in this growth, and with this in mind, the IPA is continuing its work to identify innovators who are contributing to Africa’s sustainable development and creating solutions to the continent’s everyday challenges.”
IPA believes the awards will promote home-grown innovation, scale them up and fuel change and overall development in Africa.
The 2014 IPA prize will focus on;
1) Agriculture and agribusiness
2) Environment, energy and water
3) Health and wellbeing
4) ICT
5) Manufacturing and service industry.
Only innovations by Africans for Africans are eligible to enter for the IPA 2014. Africans in the Diaspora can also apply if their innovations are of significance to Africa. The winning innovation will be awarded a cash prize of $100,000 USD, with the two runners-up each receiving $25,000 USD each.
