Celebrating Africa’s Young Innovators

Anzisha Week is an opportunity for the Foundation to celebrate the remarkable success stories of young African entrepreneurs and this year’s 12 finalists for the Anzisha Prize.  It is the power of these amazing stories that will encourage others to follow in their footsteps. Africa needs strong, innovative entrepreneurial young leaders to create jobs, solve problems and drive the economy. The continent’s future will be determined by entrepreneurial leaders across all sectors.

Now in its fifth year, the Anzisha Prize, a partnership with African Leadership Academy and The MasterCard Foundation, has grown into a powerful pan-African program that finds, develops and celebrates the continent’s youngest entrepreneurs.  The Anzisha Prize network is growing with more fellows, partners, mentors and friends. This truly unique, network of highly ambitious, driven entrepreneurs from all sectors across Africa will become a powerful force to driving economic and social prosperity across the continent.

The 12 finalists for Anzisha Prize were selected from an impressive initial pool of 494 young entrepreneurs from 33 African countries, with finalists from Zimbabwe and Ethiopia identified for the first time this year. Applications were also received from a diversity of sectors: health care, information and communication technology, education, agriculture and renewable energy. The 2015 finalists include business leader, Daniel Muskisa; agricultural trailblazer, Chantal Butare; healthcare transformer, Blessing Kwomo; technological influencer, Chris Kwekowe; economic and fashion guru, Karidas Tshintsholo; education advocate, Hidaya Ibrahim; agricultural optimizer, Sirjeff Dennis; futuristic innovator, George Mtemahanji; technological whiz, Fabrice Alomo; social entrepreneur, Mabel Suglo; health conscious visionary, Vanessa Zommi; and solution seeker, Farai Munjoma.

As Anzisha Fellows, they represent the ingenuity, ambition and innovative capacity of Africa’s youth. Like many young people on the continent, their creativity, their ambition, and their passion will transform the lives of many families, communities and the continent at large. This is what drives and inspires our work at the Foundation.

This week is also Global Entrepreneurship Week, a good time to  celebrate outstanding young people and  entrepreneurs around the world ,  and reflect on how we can foster a thriving ecosystem for entrepreneurs to develop and implement innovative solutions to social challenges or start and scale successful businesses.

The Anzisha Prize Awards Gala will take place on the 17th of November 2015 in Johannesburg.