Funmi Ogundare
A Nigerian and a Ugandan teens innovators are deploying photo voltaic expertise and Synthetic Intelligence (AI) to deal with environmental and financial demanding situations, together with calories poverty, meals waste and agricultural losses, whilst making improvements to livelihoods of their communities.
Stanley Anigbogu, the 2025 Commonwealth younger user of the yr, has transformed 600 kilogrammes of discarded plastic bottles right into a neighborhood calories hub serving internally displaced individuals in Abuja, whilst Shifra Ainomugisha, the 2026 award recipient, is the usage of solar-powered chilly garage, irrigation and AI to assist small holder farmers in Uganda scale back post-harvest losses.
Their projects reveal how youth-led inventions can fortify environmental sustainability, reinforce meals safety and create financial alternatives, with the Commonwealth offering platforms to attach younger innovators with companions, traders and policymakers.
Anigbogu, who based LightEd in 2020, advanced the Lighthouse for Peace mission to deal with calories demanding situations on the Durumi camp for internally displaced individuals in Abuja, drawing on his formative years revel in of unreliable electrical energy.
The mission reworked about 30,000 discarded plastic bottles into helpful infrastructure, together with a neighborhood calories hub, 30 photo voltaic streetlights and 20 floodlights.
The ability additionally supplies charging services and products for greater than 250 units weekly, enabling youngsters to check after sundown, making improvements to protection throughout the neighborhood and offering younger volunteers with alternatives to obtain inexperienced abilities.
“I need to make sure that darkness by no means limits every other kid’s ambition,” Anigbogu mentioned.
His initiative combines plastic waste recycling with renewable calories to deal with environmental considerations and the on a regular basis demanding situations confronted by way of displaced households.
In a similar way, Ainomugisha’s agricultural intervention emerged from her revel in rising up on her circle of relatives’s tomato farm in western Uganda, the place vital amounts of produce had been misplaced earlier than achieving the marketplace.
Involved in regards to the affect of post-harvest losses on her circle of relatives’s source of revenue and talent to fortify her schooling, she co-founded Solafam Uganda Restricted, a woman-led social endeavor that gives technology-driven answers to smallholder farmers.
The endeavor deploys solar-powered chilly garage amenities to maintain contemporary produce, whilst photo voltaic irrigation programs assist farmers deal with manufacturing right through dry classes with out depending on dear diesel-powered apparatus.
It additionally advanced LYN AI, a WhatsApp-based agricultural adviser that gives farmers with steerage on planting, pest control, irrigation, harvesting and marketplace choices.
During the aggregate of renewable calories and AI, the initiative seeks to scale back meals waste, reinforce agricultural productiveness and reinforce farmers’ earning.
Ainomugisha plans to make bigger Solafam’s operations into West and Southern Africa, adapting its expertise to the desires of various farming communities.
The Commonwealth teens awards, an initiative of the Commonwealth teens programme, supplies a platform for younger innovators to increase and scale their initiatives via seed investment, visibility and get entry to to a global community of policymakers, traders, companions and teens organisations.
The popularity has additionally enabled Ainomugisha to carry consideration to the demanding situations confronted by way of smallholder farmers and the opportunity of youth-led innovation to deal with them.
In the meantime, Anigbogu continues to pursue different technology-driven projects along his paintings with LightEd.
He based Artechubs Nigeria to deal with tutorial demanding situations via expertise and Re-build Inc., a {hardware} analysis, construction and engineering studio keen on serving to to bridge Africa’s infrastructure hole.
He’s additionally a member of the 23-person world taskforce shaping the 2026 Commonwealth teens discussion board, scheduled to carry from November 2 to 4 in Antigua and Barbuda along the Commonwealth Heads of Govt Assembly.
Themed, ‘Making an investment in Formative years Company: Co-Developing Pathways In opposition to Shared Prosperity’, the discussion board is anticipated to carry in combination greater than 300 teens delegates from 5 Commonwealth areas.
Anigbogu and Ainomugisha will percentage their reviews of translating non-public and neighborhood demanding situations into sensible answers the usage of photo voltaic expertise and AI.
Their suggestions will probably be introduced to Commonwealth leaders, with the purpose of making sure that younger other people’s views tell discussions on resilience-building and shared prosperity.
Whilst Anigbogu is demonstrating how discarded plastic will also be transformed into renewable-energy infrastructure for susceptible communities, Ainomugisha is appearing how expertise can assist farmers maintain their harvests and reinforce their livelihoods.