Deadline: 14 August, 2020
The World Bank has launched the WURI Mission Billion Challenge to provide solutions that facilitate portable contributions to social insurance programmes, such as pensions and savings accounts, by informal sector workers in West Africa.
The informal sector in West Africa is understood to be a primary driver of economic activity. In sub-Saharan Africa, 89 percent of employed women and girls are in the informal sector workforce, which accounts for 80 percent of total employment and 55 percent of total GDP.
The irregular and low earnings of informal workers leave them particularly vulnerable to economic shocks, including the Covid-19 pandemic, locust epidemics, or displacement.
Therefore, it will be necessary to build digital platforms that leverage a unique, regionally interoperable ID, government-to-person (G2P) payments, social information systems, and mobile technology to enable a new approach to social insurance schemes which are not based on a standard employment contract.
Benefits
- A total of US$150,000 in cash prizes is available
- Finalists will receive mentorship and support from Google developers experts
- Finalists will be invited to a high-level event in Washington, D.C. to present their solutions or ideas
Eligibility
- Immediate family members of the World Bank Group staff, contractors and vendors are not eligible to join the challenge
- Contestants may be individuals or organisations (profit, non-profit organisations, academic)
- Individuals must be at least 18 years of age at the time of entry
- Organisations must be legally established entities in their respective countries
- Contestants are responsible for compliance with legal requirements of their country
- Each submission must be in English, or if in a language other than English, the submission must be accompanied by an English translation of the full text
To enter and for more information, click here.
Photo source: World Bank Africa
