Can you think of a solution that will help containing the negative effects of the Coronavirus in Egypt?

Be part of the solution! Here is your chance to do so and positively impact the lives of many in your country.

A call for Egypt's innovators, entrepreneurs, scientists, engineers, product designers to hack 3 of the timely challenges faced by our society today. Best solutions will get a chance to get a symbolic award of up to 10,000 EGP.   

These challenges are supported by the Egyptian Red Crescent and sponsored by StartEgypt. Please read the following for more details!

Background

Today's challenge has a direct impact on the ground. To overcome this unprecedented challenge in our generation, we should all cooperate together. Egypt is known for its high-population density, so the spread of the Coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) may directly affect all sectors severely. 

Accordingly, we decided to proactively support our community in responding to this pandemic by stimulating innovators and ideas and encouraging them to devise ways and solutions to fight negative effect of the spread of this virus.

Suggested areas for participation in the hackathon are:

Safe Public Transport Challenge

Myth-Busting for Day-labourer challenge

Safe Banknote Challenge

Eligibility & Selection Criteria:

The ideas are open to all Egyptians and have not to be necessarily related to IT solutions. All ideas will be considered. However, you will have a better chance at winning if your idea:

1. Is innovative and hasn't been applied in Egypt yet;
2. Has potential for a positive potential impact of the idea to make a difference to one of the hacks in this call;
3. Is achievable and can be implemented in a short period of time by yourself or your team;
4. Can be scalable and sustainability (at least cost-recovery on a sustained basis).

Timeline & How to Participate:

Please make sure you are registered and fill in the required information to submit your idea. The timeline of the challenges is as follows: 

→ STAGE I:  

RECEIVING IDEAS: From 24th to 30th of March

ANNOUNCEMENT OF SHORTLISTED IDEAS: By 31st of March

→ STAGE II: 

SUBMITTING PITCH VIDEOS or PROTOTYPES: By April 3rd

ANNOUNCEMENT OF TOP IDEAS: April 5th

Challenges Details:

▶ Safe Public Transport Challenge

As the new respiratory coronavirus spreads primarily through contact with an infected person, public transport systems have to be considered a high-risk environment due to:

• The high number of people in a confined space;
• The limited ventilation inside these means of transportation
• The lack of possible control measures to identify and limite the access of potentially contaminated people;
• The exposure to a variety of common surfaces during any trip (tickets, handrails in the metro stations, etc.).

Meanwhile, public transportations are a vital service to provide mobility in general and during the crisis, specifically for those who need access to healthcare facilities, notably those who cannot afford Uber or Careem. 

How might we, then, keep the mobility to health facilities accessible? How can we provide smart and safe access to public transportation during the pandemic and even after to avoid any possible future viral transmission?

▶ Myth-Busting for Day-labourer challenge

Day Labourers constitute a large segment of the Egyptian economy with irregular employment (including intermittent or seasonal employment) reaching about 30% of the total labour force in Egypt according to the Egyptian Labour Market Panel Survey (2018). Day Labourers are not only limited to the formal sector, but a large percentage is also concentrated in the informal sector which represents more than 50 % of Egypt’s economy.

While the whole world is trying to contain the pandemic(coronavirus), pushing the citizens to stay home, this sector suffers twice, as their work mainly depends on physical efforts and going out daily to earn their bread and butter. Nevertheless, they confront fake news and instructions daily about how to deal with the coronavirus pandemic.

The day labourers work is diminishing as most of the worksites are closed and the still open ones are not well equipped to face coronavirus. These people are not tech-savvy and have limited access to the basic outreach services, which limits their chance to survive with such a crisis.

How can we empower the day labourers given their habits and their outgoing tendency and lack of the essential precautions which are mostly based on technology and what to do in case of suspected infection?

We are looking for innovative ideas that provide the necessary knowledge for this segment to raise their awareness and maintain their health and safety precautions and also an alternative living means.

▶ Safe Banknote Challenge

Porous surfaces like banknotes represent a high risk of viral transmission as it’s physically handled by tens of thousands of people and could be a vector for the spreading of coronavirus.

But depending on temperature and humidity, some surfaces, like credit cards and coins, can be a higher risk of contamination than the more porous surface of banknotes. 

How can we exchange cash money while restricting the physical contact to limit the viral spreading in our community?

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