The Anzisha Prize: 2014 Finalists Announced.

1st Sep 2014 Now, on both our feel good stories and our hero profiles, we have featured quite a few outstanding young people who have been recipients of the Anzisha Prize, a partnership between the African Leadership Academy and The MasterCard Foundation, to celebrate and support young entrepreneurs who are working to build their communities through socially impacting causes.

This year’s finalists were chosen from 339 applications and guys we are looking at a crop of very accomplished young people.

Benedicte Mundele is 20 from the DRC. She is the founder of Surprise Tropical, an organic local produce canteen to promote a healthy lifestyle in her community; 17-year-old Gabriel Kombassere from Ivory Coast is the founder of Rible Neda, a farming association that produces 20 bags of maize and 1 cargo of cassava per year to feed its members and their families. Noah Walakira from Uganda is 21 and the founder of Namirembe Sweater Makers, a community based organization that provides school uniform sweaters to over 40 schools across the country.

Nteff Alain is 22 and from Cameroon. The founder of the gifted Mom project, an e-content platform for pregnant women to combat the high mother and infancy deaths; Winifred Selby from Ghana is 19 and the founder of the Ghana Bamboo Bikes Initiative, a bamboo bike making technology to manufacture affordable multi-purpose bikes suitable for the Ghanaian terrain. 18-year-old Tom Osborn is from Kenya. He is the founder of Greenchar, a clean energy project that produces smokeless charcoal briquettes and distributes clean cook stoves throughout Kenya. Martha Chumo from Kenya is 19 and the founder of the Nairobi Developer School, an institution that provides the youth with computer programming knowledge and skills to build sustainable solutions using technology; Chineye Karl Numbers from Ghana is 19 and founder of the Mosaicpiration Project, an initiative that uses recycled material to create art and impart entrepreneurial skills to young people through training and mentorship.

We also have Chukwuwezam Obanor, a 22 year old from Nigeria and the founder of Prepclass, an online platform that provides study content for Nigerian schools in preparation for national exams; Thato Kgatlhanye from South Africa is 21 and founder of Repurpose Schoolbags, an initiative that designs school bags made from up-cycled plastic shopping bags that integrate solar technology, charging up during the day and transforming into light for learners to study after dark; Jeffrey Mulaudzi from South Africa is 22 and founder of Mulaudzi Bicycle Tours, a lifestyle tour in Alexandra township that engages members of the community by telling their stories and enveloping them into the business, creating a socio-economic transformation; and I Kodo, 22 from, Togo is the founder of LC-COM (Low cost-Computer) / Infinite Loop, a company that produces low cost personal computers for students.

The inner of the prize will receive $75,000 in prize money in a ceremony to hold in South Africa in September.