European Union Tanzania’s key partner in innovation, digitisation
The Head of European Delegation to Tanzania, Manfredo Fanti (third right), Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office (FCDO) Development Director Jane Miller and other dignitaries celebrate the launch, on Monday, of Funguo Programme in Dar es Salaam. It is a new ‘vehicle’ to champion innovation investments and unlock local potentials. PHOTO | COURTESY of HDIF
The EU Delegation is also preparing national and regional Programmes on the ICT sector in the country
Dar es Salaam. The European Union (EU) is emerging as a key player in revolutionising Tanzania’s innovation ecosystem, committing to offer financial support to boost innovation and entrepreneurship in Tanzania - in particular for women and youth.
The EU was one of the sponsors of the ongoing 2021 Innovation Week where budding innovators and entrepreneurs are showcasing their ideas and projects as well as networking to share knowledge and skills.
In addition, the EU has pledged to work on digitisation in Tanzania as one of the key areas of future support and streamlining digital solutions in all areas of its interventions.
On May 17, during the opening ceremony of the Innovation Week, the EU, in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office (FCDO), the Human Development Innovation Fund (HDIF), launched the new five-year long Funguo Programme to unlock innovation, investment, impact.
The Funguo Programme will build on the legacy of the Human Development Innovation Fund (HDIF) to support the growth of the innovation ecosystem. In particular, it will establish a stand-alone financing facility, which will provide funding to innovative impact ventures at their initial stage. It will also provide capacity building to these innovative ventures by means of technical assistance. Thirdly, Funguo will support public and private stakeholders in the innovation ecosystem to align and work towards developing innovation friendly strategies and policies.
The Programme will have a strong focus on women and youth entrepreneurs. It will work with its partners to proactively reach out to women and youth lead ventures and gear its interventions to the specific needs of young female innovators, for example through a dedicated coaching and mentoring track. In addition, it aims to build a portfolio of which 50 percent of the ventures are women-lead.
“We have high hopes that the Funguo Programme will be a key driver of innovation and entrepreneurship in Tanzania. The Funguo facility is designed to continue to live and create impact well beyond the duration of our financial support. We believe this innovative structure has the potential to become an example for a good practice to boost innovation in the region.” said Manfredo Fanti, EU ambassador to Tanzania during the launch of the Funguo Programme.
In the ICT sector, the EU Delegation in Tanzania is also preparing a national and a regional programme. The latter will aim at supporting the development of a regional EAC digital market, while the national one in Tanzania will focus on developing financial digital services, e-government services, and increased connectivity.
In addition, the European Union has pledged to streamline digital solutions in all areas of future cooperation such as strengthening democratic governance and domestic accountability, building a viable future for Tanzania’s women and youth, climate change and blue economy, and local and urban development.
“The EU believes that new technologies and digital solutions can have a multiplying effect on the results of development cooperation activities. Digital solutions can be key enablers to future economic growth, poverty reduction and shared prosperity. They have the potential to create new business models and transform industries like agriculture, mining, e-commerce, health, and disaster reduction. In addition, digital technologies are critical for city governments to efficiently deliver day to day public services,” said Cédric Merel, Head of Cooperation at the Delegation of the EU to Tanzania during a live interview at Plus TV.
The potential of emerging technologies to unlock development opportunities in priority sectors was also the focus of the event organised by the EU during the Innovation Week, in which three Tanzanian leaders in the field of innovation and drones discussed the opportunities of drone technologies for Tanzania. The discussion built on the lessons learned from the Lake Victoria Challenge Trial and Symposium that took place in Mwanza in October 2018, and the African Drone Forum and Lake Kivu Challenge, which took place in February 2020 in Rwanda. These events were supported by the EU through the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR), which is a global partnership that helps poor countries better understand and reduce their vulnerability to natural hazards and climate change.
