Description

The EAC Secretariat in collaboration with GIZ through the LIFTED Project and East African Civil Society Organizations’ Forum with financial support from the European Union is inviting applications for the East African Community Hackathon.

Designed to drive regional economic integration within the East African Community (EAC), the hackathon aims to harness the creativity and entrepreneurial spirit of women and youth Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) from across the eight EAC Partner States. At its core, the hackathon will provide a platform for nurturing innovation and collaboration, empowering participants to devise, refine and elevate transformative projects that address critical barriers to regional trade in services.

By focusing on key sectors such as tourism, agriculture, finance, ICT, logistics, and environmental management, the hackathon seeks to generate actionable and scalable solutions that will enhance the flow of services across borders, streamline economic cooperation, and foster inclusive growth within the region. Through the initiative, women and youth will be provided with a platform to showcase their ideas and will be equipped with tools, mentorship, and networks needed to turn these ideas into sustainable ventures that contribute to EAC's broader economic and social development goals.

Eligibility Criteria (What Solutions are we looking for?)

The Hackathon is receiving applications from all the East Africa Partner States including Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Rwanda, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda and Somalia who meet the following criteria:

• Must be Enterprises or Organizations registered in any of the EAC Partner states
• Must be innovative solutions addressing the East Africa Region Economic Challenges and integration issues that enable ease of movement of goods and services within the East Africa community
• Must be from a youth (between the age of 18-35 years old) or women founded enterprise or organization
• Must be solutions being implemented or have potential to be implemented in two or more Partner States
• Must be from or targeting any of these sectors: Tourism, Agriculture, Finance, Logistics, Communication, Digital Services and Environmental Conservation.
• If selected as a finalist, be available and committed to participate in all capacity enhancement sessions, the actual hackathon and final pitch events.

Assessment Criteria

Your innovative project will be assessed against the following Criteria:

• Problem statement: Clearly researched and defined problem statement backed by credible evidence
• Impact & Scalability: Applications should have a defined vision, target group and be able to demonstrate potential to solve the challenges or existing problems within the EAC
• Novelty: Applications should demonstrate how their solutions and business models are innovative while being technically and technologically suitable and viable in the EAC market
• Traction: Applications should be able to present evidence of feasibility and adoption by the target group within EAC
• Financial Sustainability: Applications must demonstrate their ability to generate revenues and long-term potential for financial sustainability
• Team: Applications should demonstrate diverse, non-discriminatory and inclusive team that is youth or women founded and led with the necessary skills to grow the enterprise

Benefits

• Grant funding of up to Euro 15,000 for each of the top 4 youth and 4 women led enterprises
• Pitching at the Regional EAC Youth Forum.
• Participation in the Training, Coaching, Mentorship and Networking Opportunities
• Opportunity to showcase and market the Innovative Solutions within the EAC

Can you apply with more than one project or enterprise?

• Yes, you can submit as many applications as you wish if they are independent innovations solving the regional integration challenges.

Application process

• To apply, fill in the application form at here and submit on or before 21st November 2024

For more information on the Hackathon and the application process, please send an email to: accelerator.kenya@e4impact.org

About LIFTED

LIFTED “Leveraging Integration Frameworks for Trade in Services and CSOs in the EAC” is a project jointly co-financed by the European Union EU, and the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). LIFTED aims to increase EAC, continental and further bilateral trade with EU in Trade in Services and Civil Society engagement in the framework of the (AfCFTA) for people-centred EAC integration. It is implemented by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) in collaboration with the EAC Secretariat.

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