MTN-WWF Africa PachiPanda Challenge 2024 for youth-led SMEs

Sep 17, 2024

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The Africa PachiPanda Challenge, a joint effort by MTN and WWF to inspire and support innovative solutions addressing pressing environmental challenges across the continent.

This program aligns with WWF’s global goals, its Africa Strategy, and its established practices. It also adds significant value to the Mobilising More for Climate (MM4C) Programme.

Specifically, the challenge contributes to achieving WWF’s core objectives of zero habitat loss, preventing species extinction, and promoting healthy populations.

Furthermore, WWF’s Africa Strategy, titled “Making Nature Count,” aims to ensure that the value of Africa’s natural capital is fully integrated into decision-making by governments, corporations, financial institutions, and society.

The Africa PachiPanda Challenge builds on the success of the PachiPanda Innovation Challenge hosted by MTN Zambia which was delivered through a partnership between MTN Zambia and the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) in 2022 and 2023.

This challenge expands and amplifies the competition through a partnership between MTN and the World Wildlife Fund.

Eligibility Requirements

The MTN Africa PachiPanda Challenge is looking for young people (16 – 35 years), youth-led SME’s, entrepreneurs, individuals, and organizations that work towards sustainable development in participating countries and employees in these sectors and are looking for ways to make their business sustainable.

Eligibility:

The Challenge is open to individuals or teams residing in the participating country. • Participants may be of any age provided they have reached the legal age of majority in their jurisdiction or have obtained parental or guardian consent.
Employees of the organizing committee, judges, sponsors, and their immediate families are not eligible to participate.
The project must be carried out in the participating country and it needs to be in line with the mission and goals of World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) Country Office and respective MTN OPCO and/or Foundation.
The application must concern an innovative project that boosts nature conservation in a contemporary way.
The application ought to have concrete and measurable results, SMART goals, and high communicative value to increase the chances of approval.

Participating countries for 2024: Zambia, South Africa, Nigeria, Cameroon and Uganda.

Challenge Details

The challenge will take place in two phases. During phase one, applications in each country will be shortlisted. Following this, selected participants will form teams of up to three members and undergo a human-centered design process during a 5-day sprint week. This process will involve business modeling, customer identification, and developing unique value propositions.

Benefits

The teams will then have the opportunity to pitch their solutions to a selected panel of industry experts, with the winning teams walking away with prizes valued at 5000 USD and advancing to stage 2 – the Pan-African contest, where they compete in the final.
The winning solutions from the challenge will be implemented to address the pressing environmental challenges in the respective countries. This will contribute to the long-term sustainability of these communities and the African continent as a whole.

Deadline: September 30, 2024