Young people, especially girls, are amongst the most vulnerable groups impacted by climate change. Plan International reports that only 2 percent of national climate plans mention girls. A study using data from 219 countries from 1970 to 2009 found that, for every additional year of education for women of reproductive age, child mortality decreased by 9.5 per cent showing that since climate-induced displacements lead to lack of access to education it will also worsen child mortality. Also, girls are more prone to drop out of school as climate disasters increase; with it is a predicated rise in child marriage, increased risk of violence and exploitation, mental health challenges, including sexual and physical abuse, and trafficking, disruption of SRHR services and malnutrition. 

As more climate disasters loom larger in some of the most vulnerable and poor countries of the world, it is crucial to engage youths in building and helping shape the climate adaptation and resilience of their communities. However, young people are also leading in climate innovations to address one of the world's biggest challenges in the last decades. 

There is need for youth-driven and innovative solutions to the Climate Change Adaptation and sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) challenges that will ensure that the challenges are through cross-sectoral engagement, building on and scaling up successful models aimed at realizing the sexual and reproductive health and rights of all, including contraceptive services, will be integrated and embedded in resilience building to climate change, and be part of local environmental sustainability plans.

Supporting the empowerment of young people, women and other populations furthest behind on gender- transformative and rights-based climate adaptation through participatory and innovative approaches will enhance the adaptive and resilience capacities of individuals and communities to the multi-layered and intersecting impacts of climate change. 

In the light of this, in 2024, UNFPA will be launching the “Let's Hack Climate Change" Hacklab, aimed at building community climate resilience improvement through direct innovation-enabled youth & women-led action. This is a buildup on UNFPA East and Southern Africa Regional Office's (ESARO) climate innovation programme. The project initiates a series of climate innovation ‘Hackathon’ targeting young people to identify and develop innovative ideas into (commercially) viable community and youth-led climate action/solutions. With lessons learned from the pilot phase, the 2024 Climate Hacklab also support smart gender transformative climate solutions. The project will ultimately build a network of innovators and a pipeline of implementation-ready innovation solutions that UNFPA Country Office's (CO's) and other partners can adopt as part of a method mix to accelerate impact in line with the UNFPA climate change value proposition.

1. First phase - UNFPA Country Office (CO) calls for innovations

The implementing UNFPA CO’s will open the call for innovation startups. UNFPA ESARO with support from identified partners will long list the country specific solutions. 

The long list will be categorised on the ENGINE (through Bright Ideas) Platform. Innovators will proceed through the product and business development cycles in the toolkit to fine tune and prepare for the CO and RO pitch events and investment readiness. 

A CO level pitch event will identify two solutions per country for the regional level pitch and showcase. ESARO will work with partners to identify a global event for the showcase and pitch.  

The regional level pitch event will identify two solutions to each receive additional $10,000 in seed and scale support as a build up on the CO level enterprise support. Innovators will receive additional thematic TA to further prepare the solutions for mainstreaming in UNFPA country level Climate Change interventions. 

2. Second phase - Investment Readiness preparation

The two regional emerging solutions will be connected to enterprise coaches in their local communities to continue with their business growth support. This investment readiness support is in line with UNFPA's plan to support scalable solutions. The UNFPA Regional Office and UNFPA CO's and partners will provide continued support to align the solutions, identify new customers, facilitate adoption and mainstreaming in country interventions in the Country Programme.

UNFPA will engage partners including AfDB to explore market access events including, exhibitions, pitch sessions, network meetings and direct product sales. Initial activities to take forward in 2024 will include country level adoption workshops. This will include country management teams and thematic teams to brainstorm and identify opportunities for mainstreaming and adoption.

Madagascar:

Risk reduction, enhanced preparedness and strengthened emergency response.

Identified opportunity areas: (1) Any idea or innovation solution that supports the empowerment and/or adaptive capacity of women, girls, young people or marginalised groups in hotspot areas affected by climate change. (2) Any idea or innovation solution that promotes access to health and protection systems to minimise the impact of climate change on SRHR issues.

Innovations that will be implemented in the districts of Amboassary, Manakara and Mananjary are encouraged. However, innovations from ANY REGION of Madagascar will be accepted. 

Mozambique:

Healthy, educated, empowered population whose sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights are addressed and fulfilled.

The Government's priorities on Climate Change are outlined in the National Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Strategy (NCCAMS)- 2013-2025. The strategic priorities are grouped into 2 pillars: (i) adaptation and reduction of the climate risk, and (ii) mitigation and low-carbon development, and complemented by cross-sectoral issues.

Innovations that will be implemented in Nampula and Zambezia are encouraged. However, innovations from ANY REGION of Mozambique will be accepted. 

Kenya: 

Risk reduction, enhanced preparedness and strengthened emergency response.

Any idea or innovation solution that promotes the involvement of young people, women, marginalised groups in programme design to help in the delivery of sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) issues in climate change affected areas. Any idea or innovation solution that promotes access to health and protection systems to minimise the impact of climate change on SRHR issues.

Innovations that will be implemented in the districts of Turkana, Mandera, Tana River and Garissa are encouraged. However, innovations from ANY REGION of Kenya will be accepted. 

South Sudan:

Strong data systems for climate vulnerability and adaptive capacity.

The Government priorities as outlined in the National Adaption Plan 2021 are: (1) Improved Coordination to Support Climate Change Adaptation and Planning, (2) Improving Human and Institutional Capacities to Support Nap Process, (3) Data, Information and Knowledge Management Systems Enhanced to Support Climate Change Adaptation Planning Processes. 

Innovations that will be implemented in Unity State, Jonglei State, GPAA Upper Nile State, Warrap State and the Lake State are encouraged. However, innovations from ANY REGION of South Sudan will be accepted.

August: Open call (1 - 21 August 2024)

August: UNFPA CO Shortlisting (last week of August)

September: Training and bootcamp

October: UNFPA CO level pitch events

November: UNFPA Regional level pitch event

December: Seed, Growth support and Showcase

We are looking for submissions addressing the impact of climate change on women, girls and young people in the following areas: 

• Any idea or innovation solution that supports the empowerment and/or adaptive capacity of women, girls, young people or marginalised groups in hotspot areas affected by climate change. 

• Any idea or innovation solution that promotes the involvement of young people, women, marginalised groups in programme design to help in the delivery of sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) issues in climate change affected areas.

• Any idea or innovation solution that promotes access to health and protection systems to minimise the impact of climate change on SRHR issues. 

• Any idea or innovation tools that promote knowledge on SRHR and Climate Change issues. 

• Any idea or innovation tools that promote the achievement of the programme areas of work as stated in the UNFPA value proposition (refer to the UNFPA Climate Change Value Proposition). 

• Promotion of SRHR and climate change information in hotspot areas (humanitarian setting, flooding, or any other early warning system/tools).

1. Ideas must be new, innovative and respond to any of the opportunity areas identified above;

2. Be based in one of the four identified participating UNFPA countries (South Sudan, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique); 

3. Demonstrate that the solution is novel in the identified country;

4. Demonstrate capacity with a clear plan for incubating the solution to scale;

5. The solution must have a minimum viable product (MVP);

6. The innovator must be 35 years or younger (African Union definition for youth). Women and girls and people with disabilities are strongly encouraged to apply; 

7. Innovations can be submitted by individuals, or teams. Innovation teams cannot be represented by more than 3 members;

8. Align with the UNFPAs transformative results and/core mandate;

9. Align with the UN principles of innovation;

10. Be scalable and commercially viable solutions. Solutions that are adaptable to other contexts with little financial injections required;

11. Have a demonstrable capacity to empower women and youth;

12. Teams must be willing to adjust their solution if advised by their Country Office and during the incubation support program;

13. Willingness to showcase their solutions through communication platforms to be determined by UNFPA

Relevance and alignment of solution:

• How relevant is the project for solving the challenges of Climate Change?

• Does the solution support any of the opportunity areas of the call at the CO level?

• Does the solution empower women and youth?

Novelty of project and desired stage of development:

• How novel is the solution (new, new application of an existing solution, or scaling existing initial pilot to new areas), aligned with UN Innovation Principles

• How robust are its results of initial prototyping/piloting/past data collection and projected milestones?

Sustainability and scalability

• Does the solution have a viable pathway to scale and sustainability via the market or public sector (definition as per UN Innovation Toolkit: driving adoption beyond the initial pilot's target population)?

• Does the company, organization or individual engage with local partners to assure viability in local conditions, and promote sustainability and scalability of the solution within the target community?

• Does the solution demonstrate potential for scalability in-country or beyond?

Project budget

• Does the proposed budget match the innovation award limits and are the outlined costs reasonable?

• Does the company/organization/individual indicate other sources of income to support their operations?

Alignment with UNFPA country programme document (CPD)

• How well does the proposed solution align with the CPD?

• Could the solution easily be integrated in future Annual Work Plans (AWP) of the CO?

1. Each winner of the CO level pitching events will be awarded 5,000 USD prize money.

2. The two winners of the final regional pitching event will be rewarded 10,000 USD seed money and enterprise support.

Click the 'Submit Idea' button at the very top of this page, fill out your form with details and budget attachment, and click submit!

25 August 2024 - APPLICATIONS ARE CLOSED

Please contact Mihuvho Mafuna at mafuna@unfpa.org