The pace of innovation is picking up around ICTs for social responsibility, promising empowerment and inclusion for SA’s marginalised communities, says IITPSA.

A wave of ICT-based social and community innovations is emerging across South Africa – both from established enterprises and a raft of innovative new start-ups. “It’s an exciting time for the sector,” says Ulandi Exner, President of the of the Institute of Information Technology Professionals SA (IITPSA).

“We’re seeing a strong and growing local focus on ICT-based innovations to drive financial inclusion, improved healthcare, food and water security and even to address environmental issues,” says Exner. This rise in social ICT innovation could be attributed to a number of factors, she says: “We know that younger Millennials and Gen Zs are very conscious of the need for social development; while at the same time, tools for software and application development have become more accessible, so more innovators are able to bring their ideas to market. South Africans appear to be embracing these changes and the wave of emerging ICT innovation we now see emerging out of South Africa is unprecedented in the IITPSA’s 61-year history.”

Notable innovations impacting South African social development include the emergence of Bank Zero, a fully digital ‘smartphone’ bank preparing for launch and designed to support financial inclusion; StokFella, a stokvel management and investment platform;  Khula, a platform for emerging farmers, Spazapp, a mobile stock management app for spaza shops; the Namola emergency platform; remote healthcare apps such as Vula; conservation and wildlife tracking solutions using IoT; and education apps such as Xander. Social innovators, supporting by a growing number of incubators, major enterprises such as Google and SAP, and development agencies such as the Technology Innovation Agency, are harnessing mobile technology, social media, IoT, drones and more to address any number of social challenges, expand inclusion and create jobs.

Welcoming this new surge of innovation in socio-IT, IITPSA this year added a Social Responsibility/Community Award to its annual IITPSA President’s Awards, which traditionally recognise the IT Personality and Visionary CIO of the Year. This year, a Technology Excellence Award will be presented to a person or team who has made exceptional or innovative use of technology for an organisation, or who has exhibited technological excellence that has delivered measurable benefit for business or the economy; and a Social Responsibility/Community Award will be presented to a person, team or project that delivers the benefits of IT on a not-for-profit basis into the community or brings the community into the IT space.  

“By broadening the field to include innovators and industry leaders in sectors we have not previously recognised, IITPSA is recognising the evolution of the ICT sector in South Africa,” says IITPSA President Ulandi Exner.

The first IITPSA Social Responsibility/Community Award will be presented at the annual IITPSA President’s Awards and gala year-end dinner in Johannesburg on 27 November. The finalists in this category are:

·         Africa Teen Geeks - an NGO that teaches youths to code. 

·         Project Isizwe - a non-profit that partners with public and private sector organisations to deploy free Wi-Fi hotspots in low-   income communities.  

·         Welgevonden Game Reserve - a ‘living laboratory’ for innovation in conservation and wildlife management, collaborating with numerous businesses to deploy new technologies for conservation.