King Abdullah II Award for Youth Innovation and Achievement aims to honor the social entrepreneurs of Arab youth who have found innovative solutions to meet the challenges of their communities, The Award seeks to provide them with the necessary support to develop their projects and help them deliver innovative solutions to the challenges facing their communities.
The Vision
His Majesty King Abdullah II Ben Al Hussein launched the award during the World Economic Forum in 2007 with a view to honor and support Arab social entrepreneurs of both genders who came up with innovative solutions to address pressing challenges in their communities in the various environmental, social and economic sectors.
KAAYIA seeks to shed light on the distinguished Arab youth efforts in achieving positive change according to the priorities and needs of their local communities, it also seeks to enhance the spirit of active citizenship, its continuity in future generations, and enhance the ability of youth to reach creative solutions to problems. KAAYIA aims to focus on the importance of a constructive dialogue between Arab youth to remove barriers and encourage them to network and cooperate with each other.
Objectives
- Recognizing entrepreneurs in the Arab world who were able to provide innovative solutions to the challenges facing their local communities.
- Provide financial support to Arab youth by helping them develop successful and distinguished projects, to reflect their outcomes on their societies.
- Encouraging cooperation and networking between the Arab youth, to facilitate the exchange of experiences and expertise.
- Urge the Arab youth to have a positive competition, and spread the culture of initiative, giving and active citizenship among them.
- Provide models for young Arabs who managed to bring positive change to their local communities.
Participation in KAAYIA
The award is granted once every two years, KAFD will set an appointment to receive applications for nomination for the award. The announcement of the award is accompanied by an advertising campaign to promote the conditions and application mechanism. Participants must fulfill the following conditions:
- Candidate must hold an Arab nationality.
- Candidate must be between the age of 21 and 35 years old at the time of submitting the nomination applications for the award.
- Candidate must be the founder or one of the founders of a project that falls within the concept of community entrepreneurship.
- In case of winning, the Candidate must be willing to manage the winning project full-time.
- The project must be in execution and at least two years have passed since it started implementing its activities.
- The project applying for the award should be executed in an Arab country.
- The cause or the problem that the project addresses or resolving must be important, and one of the priorities for the candidate’s local community.
- The project has achieved its goals and expected results in its first stage, documented reinforcements and reports should be submitted for proofing purposes.
- Candidate or the project must not have won the award in previous sessions.
Implementation mechanism
The mechanism of KAAYIA is based on selecting four finalists after careful evaluation for all candidates, relying on three basic criteria:
- Leadership and creativity.
- Partnership and cooperation.
- The project's impact on the local community and its sustainability.
The award winner will receive a financial grant aimed at developing their entrepreneurial projects and enhancing their positive impact on society. The four finalists get the opportunity to participate in a training program on building their entrepreneurship capabilities.
Achievements
- (42) entrepreneurs have received the award from (8) Arab countries.
- first cycle in 2009: 10 young people from 7 Arab countries were awarded $ (50,000) US dollars each.
- Second cycle in 2011: 10 young people from 5 Arab countries were awarded $ (50,000) US dollars each.
- Third cycle in 2013: the top 3 winners from 3 Arab countries were awarded $ (50,000) US dollars each. The seven runner-ups were awarded $ (10,000) US dollars each.
- Fourth cycle in 2015: the top 3 winners from 3 Arab states were awarded $ (50,000) US dollars each. The seven runner-ups were awarded $ (10,000) US dollars each.
- Fifth cycle winner was announced through the annual KAFD ceremony that was held under the slogan (We Are Continuing to Achieve Development), young Jordanian Leith Abu Talib won the prize of ($ 50,000) US Dollars for the (Wargami Project) that aims to spread the culture of art for all and highlight the role of this Culture in achieving interactive and inclusive education for all students and persons with disabilities.
- Sixth cycle winner was announced through Pocket Gamer Connect Jordan, Young Jordanian Rasha Abu Shakhdum won the prize of ($ 50,000) US Dollars for Martha Education App