Zayed Sustainability Prize winners announced in UAE

Abu Dhabi - There were ten winners in each of the five categories including health, food, water, energy and global high schools.

A non-profit organisation that provides high-quality solar equipment to refugee campsites and train the refugees to repair the equipment is among this year's winners of the Zayed Sustainability Prize.
The French organisation - Electricians Without Boarders - has so far carried out 129 projects in 38 countries, which have impacted the lives of 50,000 people. It was awarded $600,000 (Dh2.2 million) for winning in the energy category. They hope to use the prize money to replicate these projects in other refugee camps in Africa, Asia and the Middle East.
The 10 winners of the five categories, including health, food, water, energy and global high schools, were announced on Monday at the opening ceremony of the Abu Dhabi Sustainability Week. The winners of the health, food and water categories also received Dh2.2 million each to promote their sustainability projects while six schools from six regions were awarded $100,000 (Dh367,000) each for developing projects with sustainable solution in their school environment.
His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, presented the awards to the winners.
"We are delighted to win the Zayed Sustainability Prize. We intend to use the prize money to provide solar equipment to thousands of people in refugee camps in many parts of the world," Tanai Chawin, project manager of Electricians Without Borders, told Khaleej Times after receiving the award.
"Our aim is to provide more than 1 million beneficiaries with improved access to electricity and water."
Globhe, a Swedish small-scale firm that uses drones and artificial intelligence (AI) to detect disease outbreaks won the prize in the health category while Okuafo Foundation from Ghana - which has developed a smart app that leverages AI, machine learning and data analytics to predict and detect crop diseases and infestations - received the award in food category.
Helena Samsioe, CEO and founder of Globhe, said her firm has developed the first-of-its-kind AI-assisted global data platform for health disaster prevention and response. "We have developed over 3,600 drone pilots in 48 countries, which are connected to a platform, and collect drone data on demand," she said.
"Data is then analysed via automatic object detection and shared with clients through a download link of a Google Map with relevant insights marked out." Samsioe explained that examples of insights include malaria breeding site locations and the number of houses located within an Ebola outbreak. Globhe services assisted 100,000 people during the cholera and malaria outbreaks in Malawi and Lake Victoria.
A US-based firm, Ceres Imaging, won the award in the water category for building proprietary imagery sensors, consisting of five visible or near-infrared cameras and a thermal infrared (TIR) camera mounted onto an aircraft and use proprietary spectral imaging and AI-based analytics to optimise water use in agriculture and prevent wastage.
The winning schools are: Air Batalla, a private School from Colombia; Hakimi Aliyu Day School from Nigeria; Al Mal Junior School from Morocco; United World College - Mostar from Bosnia and Harzegovina; Bloom Nepal School from Nepal and Eutan Tarawa IETA Junior Secondary School from Kiribati.
The Zayed Sustainability Prize was created in 2008 to honour the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan's legacy of sustainable development.
ismail@khaleejtimes.com

• UAE
• Abu Dhabi