The winners of the INNO Student Challenge 2020
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The first edition of the INNO Student Challenge, in which WWF-NL encourages students to come up with innovative solutions for nature conservation problems, started in December 2019. Students could submit their innovative idea. The best ten ideas where selected, these needed to be elaborated in the form of a project plan and a project pitch. On the evening of the 29th of September 2020 the three winners were revealed. Each winner was rewarded with 10.000 euros and a professional business coach to realize their idea.
ReShore, Green Healthcare & Picking up good Vibrations
A year after the finale, we speak with the winners of 2020:
ReShore
Mitchell Williams & Frej Gustafsson thought of 'ReShore': a project that wants to reduce coastal erosion, improve coastal biodiversity and increase ocean-based production using ground-breaking, multi-purpose technology. Their mission is to design and implement ecologically enhanced breakwater solutions that protect coastlines, restore ecosystems and provide food and income to local communities.
A year later:
Founders Mitchell Williams and Frej Gustafsson are now working full-time on ReShore, trying their best to create nature-inclusive infrastructure to protect coastlines and rebuild marine ecosystems.
"Our idea was the “Living Breakwater,” a floating structure that can be placed near the shore to protect the shoreline from erosion and flooding. What is unique about our design is that it incorporates cultivation of mussels, oysters and seaweed, all of which are low-trophic species that are ecosystem engineers and contribute to (re)building ecosystems!
At the time of writing, we are testing our first prototype in a smaller scale at the world-renowned MARIN institute in Wageningen, where we spent the money from the challenge to build the prototype. Halfway through September we were accepted into the StartLife accelerator, which was a big step for us as a startup. We hope to raise a round of funding in early 2022 to have a demonstration project in the ocean sometime next year!
The INNO Student Challenge was a really, really good way for us to get our feet wet in the world of pitching and presenting our ideas and concepts to a wide variety of audiences. What was particularly interesting was the mix between presenting ideas and concepts that can have huge impact, while also making it feasible, and digestible for an audience. Overall, a very good experience that led to us taking the leap to (try to) become entrepreneurs in sustainable business!"
Green Healthcare
Kim Blommestein came up with 'Green Healthcare'. She believes that the medical world can become less wasteful and polluting. Her project aims to replace single-use materials in hospitals by reusable ones.
A year later:
After winning the challenge, Kim started her own foundation and contacted hospitals she had previously been an intern at. "I am currently making a step-by-step evidence-based guide for hospitals to swap disposables for reusables. This should make it easier for hospitals to accept change and to make it as easy as possible for them to implement changes.
The INNO Student Challenge was an amazing experience. The challenge was set up in a way that allowed contestants to develop themselves whilst participating. After submitting your project plan, there was a coaching session to help us prepare our pitches. The final event was very educational, exciting and fun. There were speakers, we could see the other contestants shortly present their project and of course socialize and connect with other innovative students from around the country! I would highly recommend anyone with a sustainable idea to participate – who knows where it will take you!"
Picking up good Vibrations
'Picking up good Vibrations' was the winning idea by Ivor Keesmaat, Eleanor Collinson and Laura Bellatowants. They want to create a world free of big game poaching. Their idea is to set up a novel kind of surveillance system that can be integrated into pre-existing monitoring systems; their system would employ detection of seismic or substrate-borne vibrations emitted by vehicles in the area, to alert park staff to the presence of suspected unauthorised vehicles in the area.
A year later:
Ivor Keesmaat, Eleanor Collinson and Laura Bellato are now Stichting GroundWaves. Ater winning the challenge, they set up their own NGO to protect wildlife from poaching by exploiting seismic vibrations.
They are currently working on that proof-of concept, while expanding their NGO’s network. The team has used the prize money to buy equipment and is currently at the start of the testing phase, creating an algorithm that can identify/detect vehicle noises and human footsteps. Winning the challenge gave them more exposure and they received help with their project for FONA Conservation and were selected by the UvA as finalists for the Universitas21 RISE competition. "We hope to have our prototype ready by 2022."
"The WWF INNO Student Challenge was an amazing experience for us, as it gave us the unique opportunity to turn our idea into reality. We met amazing people that were involved in the Challenge, from judges to the other finalists, that all had a wide variety of fantastic innovative ideas with one common goal: to make a positive change in the world."
The INNO-fund
More than twenty years ago WWF founded the INNO-fund. This fund supports Dutch foundations with their innovative nature conservation projects. The INNO Student Challenge is a spin-off of this fund and challenges students and recent graduates to come up with innovative solutions for nature conservation. The three best ideas each win 10.000 euros and professional coaching sessions. The coaches are entrepreneurs and experts in the field that will each coach one of the winning teams for the first year.
The challenge is made possible by major donors of WWF and Munt Hypotheken.