Promotional Partnership For Youth Ecopreneur Awards

The International Trade Center with the support of The Youth Café have partnered to promote the Youth Ecopreneur Awards. The Youth Ecopreneur Awards are the first of their kind which aim to promote youth entrepreneurship in the green economy. The world is facing devastating events every day which have been caused by climate change; be it wildfires, hurricanes or extreme weather.

The transition to a greener and fairer society is of high importance. The Youth Ecopreneur Awards is a business competition that seeks to create a stage for young entrepreneurs up to the age of 35 years, from least developed and emerging countries to showcase their innovative green solutions that respond to environmental challenges. 

The award is calling upon young ecopreneurs with innovative solutions in three categories; Renewable energy and energy efficiency, Sustainable waste management and Efficient use of water. Through the monetary prize for the winners (total of USD 15k) as well as technical assistance and coaching by ITC experts and partners, the award is meant to support the start-up companies of today led by young entrepreneurs and shape them into sustainable and inclusive businesses of tomorrow. This opportunity enables the start-ups to be propelled forward and increase their visibility. 

The International Trade Center is an organisation dedicated to supporting small and medium enterprises in developing countries to become more competitive and connect to international markets for trade and investment, thus raising income and creating job opportunities, especially for women, youth, and poor communities.

As a youth-led Pan-African organisation The Youth Café understands that lasting change is created through unique opportunities for unique problems facing different societies. The Youth Café has been working to develop visions of a Climate Resilient and Carbon Emission free future. As highlighted by our Theory of Change one of our key focus areas at The Youth Café, is Environmental Preservation and Climate change.

As an organisation we were privileged to attend a virtual workshop session on July 19, 2021 as part of the second phase of The Conference of the Parties, (COP26) global project. Through this workshop, we were able to explore the evidence around different solutions, share our perspectives, and determine a collective vision of Kenya’s future and collaboratively develop “Visions of a climate resilient and carbon emission free future”.

Additionally, The Youth Café is taking part in an ecopreneurship project in partnership with Engie Mobisol called “Youth na Biz”, that aims to provide entrepreneurship opportunities to disadvantaged and unemployed youth, including women, in the renewable energy sector as well as promoting green technologies for addressing the energy needs in Kenya. The project also provides other training for young people such as customer care service/ tele sales, installation technicians and sales. The trained young people are then offered attachment opportunities at Engie Mobisol. 

With a reach in some 22 countries in Africa, The Youth Café is able to engage with youth and marginalized populations through various projects. Our registered Individual and organizational memberships of 48,000 and 14,000 respectively. We are able to reach and engage with the youth and marginalized populations in our different programming under our 8 thematic areas through the diverse and individual organizational partnerships that we have.

In partnership with The International Trade Center, The Youth Café is capable of mentoring and training the award participants, providing the young people with knowledge based on environmental and climate adaptation and literacy. Additionally they will create advocacy for the creation of more green jobs and creation of a collaborative platform where young people can actively engage and participate in finding solutions to the environmental challenges. 

The Youth Café has also orchestrated partnerships, enhanced peer-to-peer learning, and inspired innovations across Africa through this diverse network. The Youth Café is increasingly seen as a digital leader with a monthly digital reach of over 600,000 people and over 147,000 newsletter subscribers. As a thought leader, The Youth Café has published 2000+ reports, and briefs, including hundreds of peer-reviewed publications on positive youth development. 

The promotion of youth entrepreneurship is fundamental to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal number 7 which focuses on promotion of development-oriented policies that support entrepreneurship, creativity and innovation and growth of small and medium sized enterprises.

The support and promotion of youth entrepreneurship is very important because it enables young men and women who are creative to develop new skills and experiences that can be beneficial in handling other aspects of their life.

It also creates the opportunity for revitalization of the local communities by providing valuable goods and services. In the case of environment and climate innovations brought to life by young men and women in areas such as Africa where the majority of the population live in poverty. Supporting such startups will enable communities in those regions to live a sustainable lifestyle.    

The Youth Café works with young men and women around Africa as a trailblazer in advancing youth-led approaches toward achieving sustainable development, social equity, innovative solutions, community resilience and transformative change.

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