#OceanChallenge 4Africa

When 8-10 April 2022

Where Online

  • Overview
  • Agenda
  • Topic Areas
  • Resources
  • The coastal and marine environments in Africa expand over 35,000 kilometers of coastline in 38 countries on the continent and deliver numerous ecosystem services, among which food provisioning, climate regulation, cultural benefits, tourism, shipping, to name just a few... 🌊🐠


    While the ocean holds a vital role in the lives of many African communities and offers many opportunities, it is also threatened by climate change and increasing pressures derived from human activities, affecting the health and resilience of marine environments and biodiversity.

    To tackle these ocean challenges in the coastal and marine regions of Africa and to pool African energies to grasp opportunities offered by the ocean, we are organizing #OceanChallenge4Africa! It is a one-of-a-kind 48-hour journey to create transformative and impact-driven solutions and contribute to the sustainable use of ocean and coastal resources that will improve livelihoods for coastal communities in Africa.


    🌊The #OceanChallenge4Africa online hackathon is organized by Mercator Ocean International, IOC Africa and Garage48; and supported by Segal Family Foundation. It is further held in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme, GEO Blue Planet and the African Group on Earth Observations (AfriGEO). The event uses  the EU’s Copernicus Marine Service, EMODnet and EUMETSAT data. 


    This event echoes Mercator Ocean international’s mission towards a global ocean knowledge for a sustainable ocean aligned with the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development’s vision. Aimed to engage communities in developing Earth Observation-based products, this event also supports the African Union Agenda 2063 frameworks, the "African Space Strategy" and "African Blue Economy Strategy".


    The working language is English. Partial French support and translations to the pre-events will be provided, but at least one team member must speak English to ensure the team is able to make the most of the hackathon.

    #OceanChallenge4Africa – Make waves with marine solutions!


    👉🏾 Register to the hackathon here: https://eventornado.com/event/OceanChallenge4Africa#home


    FOR WHOM?

    This event is organized to foster the development of transformative ocean science solutions to

    build a thriving blue economy and promote a sustainable ocean in Africa. Hence, we welcome

    participants either living in or from Africa to contribute to this undertaking.


    We invite business visionaries, marketing wizards, project managers, educators, web/app developers, UX/UI designers, entrepreneurs, product/service developers, marine and coastal field experts and students, environmentalists, data scientists, meteorologists, oceanographers, marine biologists, and other interested individuals with the desire to contribute to the development of new and change-making products and services with their knowledge and skills.


    Participation is for free. 

    🌍 WHERE? 

    #OceanChallenge4Africa is an online hackathon. Join us from anywhere in Africa!


    TOPIC AREAS

    In the frame of the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development, the #OceanChallenge4Africa hackathon will focus on 3 out of the 7 Ocean Decade Outcomes for the Ocean We Want:

    🌊 A healthy and resilient ocean;

    🌊 A productive ocean;

    🌊 A safe ocean;


    Read more about each topic area in the tab with the same name. 

    🏆PRIZES 

    • Cash prize pool of 10,000€ (approx. $11,000)
      Including 5,000€ from Copernicus Marine Service and 5,000€ from Segal Family Foundation

    • 3 month virtual incubation program from SING SA

    • Pre-selection of 1 team for the OceanHub Africa Acceleration Program: a straight-pass to pitching in front of the Selection Committee

    • Multiple places to the TECA accelerator program to develop a fintech solution for the African blue economy

    • One year access to EU's Copernicus DIAS reference service for environmental data WEkEO for all winners (each access has a value of 1040 €)

    • The opportunity to present the winning project as a “data-user testimony” during a Copernicus Marine Service event

    • Best projects will be added to the “Use Cases” section of the Copernicus website for visibility and recognition

    • Virtual tickets to SA Innovation Summit for all members of a team + 1 physical ticket

    • Delegate passes and discounted booths to the Ocean Innovation Summit in February 2023

    • #OceanChallenge4Africa goodies

    • The prize fund is growing, stay tuned for updates

     

    Please note that all monetary prizes are subject to withholding local taxes.


    TEAM FORMATION

    Garage48 hackathons have proven to be a great opportunity to meet fellow talents, potential co-founders, employers and employees, and work together with field experts who will support you in the process! So, come and form your dream team, put your skills to the test, and create new solutions for the market.


    You can register as an individual or a team. You can register with an idea and put together a team of skilled individuals who are looking for an idea to work on, or if you don't have an idea, you are very welcome to join a team with an idea you like. There’s plenty of fish in the sea! 🐠


    Eligibility criteria:

    • We’re welcoming participants either living in or from Africa

    • The team should consist of a minimum of 4 members - idea owner, field expert, data

    specialist and ideally also a developer/designer (needed to develop the idea into the technical prototype). The maximum number of team members is 8. 

    • Teams must use at least one Copernicus Marine Service data product. All teams that have been selected to participate in the hackathon will be given access to the data 2 weeks before the event so that they can get familiar with it and receive necessary information and support from the Copernicus Marine Service Service Desk. (Find more information in the "Resources" tab).

    • Additional datasets will be provided for the teams if necessary.

    • Teams must have at least one English-speaking member in the team.

    • Only ready-made and pre-selected teams formed during the registration process are

    accepted to participate in the hackathon on April 8 - 10.


    PRE-EVENTS

    An important part of getting yourself maximum ready and making the most of the hackathon is attending the carefully designed pre-events!


    Don't miss the opportunity to:

    • Get to know the topic areas in more depth and understand your problem-solution fit

    • Learn about the Earth Observation (EO) data available for Africa and get inspired by existing solutions

    • Get familiar with the data sets and learn how to use them

    • Validate your ideas, mix and mingle with other participants and form teams


    All the pre-events are listed below.


    TIMELINE

    27 January - Program launch and registration opens on Eventornado here.

    27 January - Pre-event #1: Introduction to the topic areas and data in Africa (Rewatch the live here)

    8 February - Pre-event #2: Introduction to Copernicus Marine Service, WEkEO (Rewatch the live here)

    1 March - Pre-event #3: How to use data & platform (More information on Facebook here)

    19 March - Pre-event #4: Team formation / matchmaking (Zoom). Come and pitch your idea, get valuable feedback from mentors, find missing roles for your team, or join an idea you like!

    22 March - Registration and idea submission deadline (Eventornado)

    25 March - Announcement of the ideas that are accepted to the hackathon (Eventornado)

    28 March - Team formation deadline around the accepted ideas (Eventornado)

    8 - 10 April - #OceanChallenge4Africa online hackathon. 48 hours of teamwork, mentoring, and prototyping!


    👉🏾 Register to the hackathon here: https://eventornado.com/event/OceanChallenge4Africa#home

    PRE-EVENTS

    All times are in Johannesburg, South African time (GMT +2).

    27 January - Pre-event #1: Introduction to the topic areas and data in Africa (More information on Facebook here)

    8 February - Pre-event #2: Introduction to Copernicus Marine Service, WEkEO (Facebook live)

    1 March - Pre-event #3: How to use data & platform (Facebook live)

    19 March - Pre-event #4: Team formation / matchmaking (Zoom). Come and pitch your idea, get valuable feedback from mentors, find missing roles for your team, or join an idea you like!


    Rewatch all the pre-events at any time on this link.


    HACKATHON AGENDA

    All times are in Johannesburg, South African time (GMT +2).


    Friday, April 8th

    15:00 Opening Ceremony (Facebook live stream)

    16:00 Checkpoint #1

    17:30 Teamwork and mentoring starts
    20:00 Design Thinking Workshop - introducing the prototyping tools

    20:45 - … Teamwork continues


    Saturday, April 9th

    09:00 Checkpoint #2

    10:00 Teamwork and mentoring

    14:00 Topic talk (Facebook live stream, approx. 35 minutes)

    17:00 Pitch training: How to prepare your demo and pitch?

    18:00 Checkpoint #3

    19:00 - … Teamwork continues


    Sunday, April 10th

    09:00 Checkpoint #4
    12:00 Deadline to submit the demo/pitch video
    15:00 Announcing the top teams whose demo will be shown in the Finals

    16:00 Final Live (Facebook live stream)
    18.00 Jury makes the final decision

    19:00 Award ceremony

    The ocean holds a vital role in the lives of many African communities and offers many opportunities, but faces multiple threats, affecting the resilience capacity of its marine environments and biodiversity. To tackle the existing ocean challenges in the coastal and marine regions of Africa, we invite participants to create innovative solutions and contribute to the sustainable use of ocean and coastal resources that will particularly increase opportunities and improve livelihoods for coastal communities in Africa... All solutions have to use at least one Copernicus Marine Service data product.


    There are many possible approaches you can take regarding your projects: you can create brand new solutions, adjust proven solutions to your regional or local context, add relevant features to existing solutions. You could for example imagine innovative data visualizations for academic purposes or for raising awareness around the African coastal environment. Mobile, web apps, platforms - it’s your call!

     The best solutions will be awarded cash prizes from the prize pool of €10 000!


    For inspiration, check out use case demos on the Copernicus Marine Service website:
    https://marine.copernicus.eu/services/use-cases


    We invite participants to focus their projects on contributing to one of the Ocean Decade Outcomes for the Ocean We Want:


    🌊 A HEALTHY AND RESILIENT OCEAN

    The ocean health and the resilience of marine environments and biodiversity are threatened by climate change and increasing pressures derived from human activities. This challenge is about ensuring that the marine ecosystems have the capacity to endure and rebound from the pressures, threats and stressors they face; and can continue delivering the vital services they provide. Solutions need to be developed to monitor, protect, manage and restore ecosystems and their biodiversity under changing environmental, social and climate conditions; to map and prevent land and sea-based sources of pollutants and contaminants.

    Get inspired by these ideas:

    • Map coastal sensitive and vulnerable areas for impact assessments and necessary protection measures

    • Map coastal land use, monitor coastal health and detect changes

    • Map adjacent land use effects on the coastal environment (agricultural pollution, influence of rivers and outflows on the coastal environment, sediment persistence in relation to hazardous substance sources)

    • Identify potential Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) by mapping nearshore coastal and marine habitats and ecosystem services

    • Monitor oil spills: to plan oil spill cleanup accordingly, set up preventive measures, improve shipping routes to avoid sensitive areas

    • Identify plastic pollution hotspots

    • Green energy – use Earth observation data to find wave or wind energy hot spots

    • Avoid human-wildlife conflict: Identify wildlife routes to plan shipping routes accordingly, avoid disturbing underwater noise for wildlife.


    🌊 A PRODUCTIVE OCEAN

    In Africa, more than in other parts of the world, fish constitute a major source of food. In some countries, 90 percent of dietary protein comes from fish. It is crucial to raise awareness and develop solutions to optimize the role of the ocean in sustainably feeding populations under changing environmental, social and climate conditions.

    Find solutions related to:

    • Fish stocks – track fish hotspots or fishing activity (incl. overfishing and illegal fishing)  

    • Mapping potential no-fishing zones to allow the recovery of depleted fish stocks and corals

    • Predict and prevent phenomenons like harmful algal blooms from growing out of control

    • Monitoring water quality in fisheries and ocean fishing regions

    • Monitoring and controlling fishing trade

    • Monitoring water quality to allow sustainable and efficient aquaculture

    • Sustainable fisheries and ocean fishing


    🌊 A SAFE OCEAN

    Shipping routes, fishing, trade, travel… Many activities of the blue economy depend on maritime safety, on a safe ocean. It is important to monitor the ocean and weather forecast to increase communities' resilience to ocean hazards, secure shipping routes and ensure fish access. We need to create solutions to warn, prepare for all the increasing ocean and coastal hazards (geophysical, ecological, biological, weather, climate, and anthropogenic related).

    You could imagine ideas related to:

    • Emergency management / search and rescue measures

    • Real-time disaster warnings (storms, cyclones, floods, etc.)

    • Potential new shipping lanes and navigation route optimisation

    • Real-time ship traffic view for operational monitoring

    • Map coastal flooding and coastal erosion

    • Seasonal rainfalls

    • Coastal circulation


    All participating teams must use at least one of the following Copernicus Marine Service data products. You are free to combine them or add data from other sources, including EMODnet and/or EUMETSAT, data partners of the event..

     

    1. The Copernicus DIAS WEkEO platform - https://www.wekeo.eu/

    As the hosting platform of the event, WEkEO provides access to all Copernicus datasets (including data from EUMETSAT and Copernicus Marine Service) and a cloud-based processing environment.


    The teams selected to attend the hackathon on 8-10 April will get access to free WEkEO computational resources (virtual machine, storage, JupyterHub…) for the entire duration of the hackathon.


    All winning teams will be granted a year of free WEkEO access: https://www.wekeo.eu/documentation/using_virtual_machines


    2. Copernicus Marine Service products – http://marine.copernicus.eu/services-portfolio/access-to-products/

    The Copernicus Marine Service provides free access to global observation products (in situ and satellite) and modeling data for the physical ocean (waves, sea level, currents, temperature, salinity….), the biogeochemical ocean (nutrients, chlorophyll, plankton, ocean color etc).


    Find help & guidance to use the Copernicus Marine Service products:


    3. Copernicus ocean data from EUMETSAT – https://www.eumetsat.int/eumetsat-data-store

    EUMETSAT operates and delivers ocean data from the Sentinel-3 and 6 satellites.


    Find help & guidance to use the EUMETSAT products:


    4. EMODnet - http://www.emodnet.eu/

    Other useful marine data:


    Learning resources:


    WHAT IS SAID

    #OceanChallenge4Africa #g48spacetech

    THE SUPERSTARS
    The Mentors 

    Joao Rei
    Garage48 host, business and marketing mentor
    Triin Preem
    Startup Segment Manager at Swedank Eestis
    David Clark
    Founder Tallon OÜ | Venture Partner at Tera VC I Entrepreneur & Angel Investor
    Henrik Rank
    Lead Developer @ Montonio Finance 
    Martin Verrev
    Creative Engineer at Littlebit and lecturer at TalTech
    Dr. Hayley Evers-King
    Marine Applications Expert at EUMETSAT
    Dr. Robinson Mugo
    Project Manager, SERVIR at Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development (RCMRD)
    Dr. Majambo Gamoyo
    Oceanographer at Regional Centre for Mapping of Resources for Development (RCMRD)
    Sikho Msomi
    Co-Founder of On Point Communications
    Jaan Praks
    Doctor of Science (Technology), Space technology and remote sensing at Aalto University
    Dr. Marié Smith
    Senior researcher in Marine Earth Observation
    Bennet Atsu Foli
    Oceanographer, University of Ghana
    Gideon Brefo
    Chief Executive Officer at hapaSpace Collaborative Hub
    Tim Collart
    Marine Data Analyst and GIS Support Officer at EMODnet
    Helen Kokk
    Design Product Lead
    Niccolò Bassan
    Associate Expert (JPO) at UN Environment Programme
    Mika Odido
    IOC Coordinator in Africa
    Fabrice Messal
    UX & Capacity Development Manager, Mercator Ocean International
    Romane Zufic
    Capacity Development Officer at Mercator Ocean International
    Elena di Medio
    Technical Manager, Copernicus Marine Support Team
    Amine El Amrani
    Satellite imagery consultant on WEkEO at CS GROUP
    Elodie Gutknecht
    Oceanographer specialized in validation of biogeochemistry at Mercator Ocean International
    Simon Van Gennip
    Research Scientist at Mercator Ocean International
    Mariin Petoffer
    UI/UX Designer at DUX studio

    Organizers

    Kadi Aguraijuja
    Project Manager at Garage48
    Jana Saastamoinen
    Project Manager at Garage48
    Fabrice Messal
    UX & User Learning Manager, Mercator Ocean International
    Romane Zufic
    Capacity Development Officer, Mercator Ocean International

    The Program is brought to you by: