Inventive Africa has been offline for a while, due to circumstances out of our control, but we are back with a vengeance! African innovation is still at the heart of our passion, and we want to inspire you with the innovations of brilliant creators across the entire continent.
Africa as a whole gets bad press around the world. The stereotypes that creep through into the perception on the world’s view of Africa is incredibly damaging the the continent. Whether disease, corruption, revolution or violence, the African continent often struggles to attract investment and tourism and has to settle for the pity and aid given “charitably” from the outside world. Despite this, the trend for investing on the continent is increasing, with many understanding that the African market is flourishing, with a youthful population, and different problems requiring different solutions.
The perceptions of the outside world are finding their way into the continent and we believe they are taking their toll on the self esteem of many potential brilliant innovators. These creative people sometimes lack believe in their ideas, and need to be encouraged to follow through and put their ideas into action. Whether it is a small solution to a community problem, or an idea that can change the infrastructure in an entire country, we want to inspire African innovation for Africa, across the continent.
Over the years, we have covered many innovations that have had the potential to change the face of Africa. From Zipline drones delivering medical supplies in Rwanda, to the massive amount of Fintech innovations, changing the way we deal with payments, credit ratings and insurance. These ideas are being built on and refined to become a better fit for a wider market. And at the same time, many of you are out there solving more problems continent wide.
So what solutions do we expect to pop up soon? Well, with the world in the midst of the Covid 19 crisis, there are some circumstances that need to change across Africa (If not the world) Firstly, lockdowns are hard to manage when many workers are informal and off the books. Without proper records it is impossible to support those most in need, let alone receive tax.
The health care sector clearly needs more innovation, whether finding short term mobile centres for patient isolation, or better access to online treatment for those that can not get to the doctors because of risk of infection.
Food security could also be a possible area for innovation. Farming techniques, such as aquaponics, better more reliable storage, in country manufacture, utilising food waste and many other areas of agriculture need a new impetus of creativity to ensure that when borders are closed Africa does not need to rely on food imports to survive.
Of course there are many other areas that still require innovation, and there are thousands of great minds across the continent pushing their ideas forward. We will continue to share great new startups with you and hope that you are inspired to trust in your own ideas.
If you have an innovation in Africa, no matter how big or small, please get in contact. We would like to feature you. Either reach out to us on Twitter, or email us as Inventiveafrica1@gmail.com
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