Recently updated on January 31st, 2023 at 12:14 pm
Covenant University has emerged overall winner of the ENACTUS Nigeria National Competition 2019 themed: “Leapfrogging Human Capital Development”, which held between July 10-11, 2019 at The Civic Centre, Victoria Island, Lagos.
The Covenant University ENACTUS team emerged victorious over 18 other teams from various universities across the country. The team had finished in second place for two years in a row both times losing to Ahmadu Bello University (ABU). This time however, they got the better of ABU who finished at second place and in September 2019, will represent Nigeria at the ENACTUS World Cup in San Jose California, USA.
Their project, The Pet City initiative, which focused on turning plastic waste into sustainable building materials that are durable and cost effective, was the project that earned them the victory in this year’s competition. According to their team lead, David Iyiola, the Pet City initiative “will reduce the cost of providing houses by 60% and would increase the annual income and standard of living of 150 women by 25%.”
Their second project: TOLES, is a social enterprise that aims at providing children in impoverished communities with eco-friendly and durable footwear from used and scrap tyres. The team successfully produced and distributed 3,922 footwear, created jobs for 257 persons at the production factory and repurposed over 600 waste tyres. The team expressed gratitude to Guaranty Trust Bank for the ₦1 million grant that enabled them kick-start the project.
At the semi-final round Award Ceremony, the teams that proceeded to the final round were the ENACTUS teams from Bayero university Kano, Ahmadu Bello university Zaria, Covenant University and University of Agriculture Makurdi.
The competition had in participation, active participants of over 1,000 individuals comprising students and academic leaders from over 25 Nigerian tertiary institutions, business leaders and observers from various organizations.
As with the tradition of the ENACTUS Nigeria annual competition, 18 Enactus teams were split across four Leagues in the opening round of competition with each league having an average of 4 teams having 25 minutes each to make an Audio-Visual presentation of projects they have carried out in the preceding year that has improved the quality of lives and living standards of those around their local communities. 3 teams from each league to total 12 advanced to the semi-final round of the competition.
The first day also featured a leadership and innovation summit sponsored by Aspire Coronation Trust (ACT) Foundation with the theme: Multi-Stakeholder Collaborations: A Tool for Achieving Sustainable Large Scale Social Impact. The session was moderated by Kunbi Wuraola (Principal Consultant, Discover Your Potentials) and the panelists included Tonye Cole (Co-Founder, Sahara Group), OsayiAlile (CEO, ACT Foundation), Abosede George-Ogan (Director Strategy, Funding and Stakeholder Management, Lagos State Employment Trust Fund).
The leadership challenge competition followed immediately after the summit and the ENACTUS teams from University of Ibadan in 1st place, Bayero university Kano and Federal university of Agriculture Abeokuta in 2nd place emerged as winners and were given cash rewards of ₦400,000 and ₦300,000 respectively to further scale up their projects.
The second day of the event witnessed competition from the 12 teams that advance from the opening round with the Sahara Group Energy Efficiency Innovation Exhibition from the Enactus Teams from Federal University of Technology Owerri, Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Tai Solarin University of Education, Kaduna Polytechnic, and University of Port-Harcourt happening concurrently.
ENACTUS, which is an acronym for Entrepreneurial Action US, is an international community of students, academic and business leaders who use entrepreneurial action to create a better world.
