M&D Construction Group sponsored the 10 Lenovo tablets that groups of high school learners recently won in an Ivanplats competition aimed at creating awareness of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.

Groups of learners across grades from 18 high schools throughout the Mokopane Circuit participated in the competition.

The winners proposed the most innovative solutions to a host of environmental problems, such as climate change and air and water pollution. They ranged from novel renewable energy generation and energy efficiency projects through to unique waste recycling initiatives. To encourage “out-of-box” thinking that is needed to solve the many environmental challenges that the world faces today, there were no limits imposed on the creativity of learners.

Written proposals were collected from the participating schools by the Ivanplats team on 1 August 2023 and assessed by an internal adjudication panel.

Eight finalists were then selected, and each received an award of R1 000 to buy the materials that they needed to build models of their inventions.

They presented these models to a panel of judges consisting of representative of regulators and Ivanplats contractors that sponsored the competition at a final adjudication event.

Peet Reyneke, a M&D Contracts Director, represented M&D on the adjudication panel.

“The judges were exceptionally impressed by the creativity of the learners in finding ‘green’ solutions that we need to meet the SDG goals. All of the finalists had worked very hard on their submissions, which were of a very high standard. It was, therefore, a difficult decision to choose winners. Based on the quality of the models, it was very evident that sustainability is close to the heart of our youth. This is important as they will inherit the earth one day and pass it on – hopefully in a better condition – to the generations to come,” Reyneke says.

He also presented the tablets to members of the winning groups on behalf of M&D at a prestigious awards ceremony hosted by Ivanhoe in Industria on 29 September 2023. The winners were overjoyed with their new Tab M10 second generation 32GB LTE tablets, which will improve quality of education at these schools.

“The world faces many daunting challenges which, in addition to global climate change, includes poverty and entrenched inequalities. Our youth possess massive transformative capabilities. It is imperative that we invest in our young people so that they can serve as

innovators, entrepreneurs and agents of change,” Rukesh Raghubir, CEO of M&D Group, concludes.