It is with great pleasure and excitement that the SEED Initiative today announces the 2011 SEED Award Winners!

Nairobi, 15 December 2011 From a company that transforms groundnut shells into fuel briquettes in Gambia, to an enterprise that has developed solar ovens in Burkino Faso, to an initiative that trains and employs street youth to collect waste materials in Ghana, which they then transform into handmade designer products, to a business in Kenya where women produce aloe-based skin care products, these are just some the 35 winners of the 2011 SEED Awards, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) announced today.

“One of the most urgent – but not widely explored - questions at the centre of the debate on transitioning to the Green Economy is how to engage with and deploy the main engine of the global economy – small, micro- and medium-sized enterprises (SMMEs).

Read more...

SEED Symposium:

UN Women, the UN organisation dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women has partnered with SEED and will sponsor one special SEED Gender Equality Award in 2011 to initiatives that are women-led or owned, and prioritise gender equality or women’s empowerment as a core objective. Read more...

Oro Verde, 2009 SEED Gold Winner, which was created by and for small-scale miners in the Chocó region (Colombia) has now reached international recognition and its impacts is growing.

Madagascar is working towards a national plan for marine turtle conservation. Sponsored by the Indian Ocean and Southeast Asian Marine Turtle Memorandum of Understanding (IOSEA), the Madagascar's national environmental research agency, the Centre National de Recherche sur l'Environment (CNRE) and the non-governmental organization Blue Ventures, have organised the development of a countrywide conservation plan for threatened marine turtles in the form of a national workshop taking place in Madagascar's capital, Antananarivo.

Nairobi, 05 July 2011 - Social and environmental entrepreneurs who can demonstrate innovation, leadership and sustainability have the chance to win expert assistance and support for their sustainable development initiatives in the 2011 SEED Awards.

Pretoria, South Africa - 15th April 2011

Together with UNEP, SEED hosted a high-level symposium on the Green Economy in Pretoria, South Africa, on Friday 15 April.  Speakers and panelists from government, civil society, industry bodies, international organizations and academia will underline the importance and necessity of moving towards a greener economy.