Côte d'Ivoire chemical engineer Noël N’guessan has won the Royal Academy of Engineering’s 2021 Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation.
He developed biowaste equipment for smallholder farmers in West Africa to efficiently manage and generate income from biowaste.
N'guessan and his team designed the composter and biodigester specifically to ferment agricultural post-harvest by-products into solid and liquid compost and cooking gas.
“Biowaste represents two- to five-times the quantity of crops or produce sold, amounting to 30-million tonnes of waste disposed a year in Côte d’Ivoire.
"By repurposing this waste, [the equipment] can help Ivorians generate extra income and improve the lives of thousands of farmers and their families,” says N’guessan.
The Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation, founded by the UK Royal Academy of Engineering in 2014, is Africa’s biggest prize dedicated to engineering innovation, and has a proven record of identifying successful engineering entrepreneurs.
It is in its seventh year supporting talented sub-Saharan African entrepreneurs with engineering innovations that address crucial problems in their communities in a new and appropriate way.
Entries for the eighth Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation are now open and will close on July 20.
Individuals and small teams living and working in sub-Saharan Africa, and who have an engineering innovation, are invited to enter.