Young talent working together to tackle SDG challenges
GCI Postdoc Ferdinand Postma was selected to attend UNLEASH 2017 in Denmark.
Postdoc Dr Ferdinand Postma attended the UNLEASH Innovation Lab 2017 in Copenhagen, Denmark. This co-creation workshop funded by the United Nations brought together young talent (primarily under the age of 35) from all walks of life i.e. academics, entrepreneurs, policy specialists, engineers etc. from across the globe.
“The idea behind this workshop was to promote engagement between specialists from different work areas and experiences to come up with practical solutions to meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),” explains Postma.
Participants were grouped into teams to develop sustainable, economically viable solutions pertaining to seven of the SDGs namely health, water, energy, sustainable production and consumption, food, education and ICT, and urban sustainability.
“Each group had the opportunity to look at an SDG goal, identify obstacles or problems in the way of achieving these goals and come up with innovative solutions to the problems. The groups consisted of experts from different fields which enabled us to look at the problem holistically. It was a transdisciplinary knowledge sharing exercise bringing people together who have different knowledge bases e.g. scientists, economists, entrepereneurs, engineers, and activists” explains Postma.
He further elaborates, “We focused on developing solutions that could potentially have a big global impact, based on the regional or local knowledge and experience of people from all over the world.”
Each solution was presented, peer reviewed and later assessed by experts. The teams who made it to the last round were given the opportunity to present their ideas to impact investors – mirroring a Dragon’s Den format.
All presentations will be made public and published in a booklet to be distributed to investors later in the year.
“It was a fantastic global networking experience. I made valuable contacts, and I am still in contact with my team members who are based all around the world,” concludes Postma.