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Invention for Sustainable Development Program

Africa

Kenya & Tanzania

Kenyan man transporting his goods using the Xtracycle load-carrying bike.
Kenyan man transporting his goods using the WorldBike load-carrying bicycle.

  • KickStart develops agricultural technologies to help very poor entrepreneurs start businesses. The Foundation granted funds for KickStart to design a portable, manual, well-drilling technology, and to transfer its technologies from Kenya to Tanzania. Most recently, the Foundation provided funds for KickStart to develop three new or redesigned pump products and to support the creation of a technology development center.

Kenya

  • WorldBike created a retro-fit attachment that turns ordinary bicycles into load-carrying vehicles that can be used by their owners as income generating tools.

Tanzania

  • Sustainable Harvest and Root Capital are introducing new coffee technologies to farmers in eastern Tanzania that will allow them to increase their incomes while encouraging protection of local biodiversity.

  • E+Co is undertaking a project to build a key link in the solar energy distribution chain – the rural enterprise – that promises to provide rural households with access to affordable and sustainable energy

Senegal

  • EnterpriseWorks/VITA is testing the technical feasibility of inventions developed in Senegal as local solutions to economic, environmental, and quality of life challenges.

South Africa & Mozambique

  • Roundabout Playpumps, a South African-based company, has installed over 500 of its innovative, energy-harnessing Playpumps within South Africa and is working to expand its operations to Mozambique.

Sub-Saharan Africa

  • The Freeplay Foundation is developing wind-up lighting devices that, when combined with high-quality netting, will create mosquito-free – and therefore safe – light spaces for work, study and leisure.

Uganda

  • Sevak Solutions, a non-profit organization that supports economic development in emerging countries, is refining and scaling a technology that will enable micro-finance institutions to extend banking services to rural parts of the developing world.