Ye! Community Youth Ecopreneur Awards 2021

Deadline: September 15, 2021

Applications are open for the Ye! Community Youth Ecopreneur Awards 2021. The Youth Ecopreneur Awards are a green business award competition specifically targeted at young entrepreneurs from least developed and developing economies.

The Awards offer a stage and sounding board for youth to showcase their sustainable and scalable solutions to accelerate the green economic transition and to receive support on this journey. The Awards will recognise success stories of young businesses generating a commendable impact on the environment.

Categories

The Awards call for young ecopreneurs with innovative solutions in three categories:

• Renewable energy and energy efficiency: This award category recognizes the solutions of youth ecopreneurs to enable and accelerate a transition to renewable energy and to use energy more efficiently.
• Sustainable waste management: This award category recognizes the solutions of youth entrepreneurs to tackle challenges related to reducing, collecting, managing, and treating waste.
• Efficient use of water: This award category recognizes the solutions of youth ecopreneurs to ensure smart management of water for all.

Benefits

Winners

• A cash prize of $15,000 USD ($5,000 USD per category).
• Technical assistance to scale your innovative green business, delivered by ITC and partner experts in the digital, green, legal and financial space.
• Support in matching with investors.
• International visibility – you will be able to share your story with global audiences, be featured in ITC’s and their partners’ various media channels and events.
• A ticket to SLUSH, the world’s leading start-up event.
• Speaking slots at the next local, regional and international events.
• Opportunity to get involved in ITC GreenToCompete networks’ initiatives and to be part of the Ye! Community.

Finalists

• Support in matching with investors.
• Access to Coaching delivered by seasoned entrepreneurs, tech and digital geeks, legal and financial experts on how to be agile entrepreneurs in the green space and how to grow your business internationally.
• Networking and collaboration opportunities with experts who are passionate about driving change.
• Invitations to local, regional and international networking events.
• Opportunity to get involved in ITC GreenToCompete networks’ initiatives and to be part of the Ye! Community.

Participants

• Benefit from peer-to-peer support and knowledge exchange by joining our Ye! Community platform.
• Access to a wide range of tools and services offered by the Ye! Community platform, ITC’s GreenToCompete network, and their partners.
• Updates about funding and training opportunities.

Eligibility

Open to businesses that are:

• majority-owned by ecopreneurs below the age of 35 (i.e. born after 30 July 1985);
• legally registered in a developing or least developed country;
• offering a solution (a technology, product, service or process) in one of the Awards categories:
  • Promotes renewable energy and energy efficiency
  • Reduces and recovers waste
  • Ensures efficient use of water

Application

There are around 30 questions that you will need to answer carefully in the application form. You can save a draft and go back to complete the form and submit your final answers.

Apply now or nominate a Youth Ecopreneur