A relatively new local organization, Create Caribbean Inc., has been selected as one of eight partners in the Caribbean to participate in a regional competition called the Agrihack Talent Competition.
According to Associate Director of Create Caribbean Inc., Veronne Nicolas, the Agrihack Talent Competition aims to support the development of ICT innovations and entrepreneurship in agriculture.
She said, “It was hosted in East Africa last year and they are actually promoting the use of ICT to grow entrepreneurship and develop the agriculture sector. This year they have initiated it within the Caribbean. The have gotten a few hubs in the Caribbean to take part in this venture.”
The Technical Center for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation, the Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute (CARDI) and the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) will work together towards the success of the event.
The event which targets young people 18-35, will be a two-day affair.
On September 6th interested groups and individuals will meet at the grounds of the Dominica State College. There they will be presented with agriculture-related challenges. The participants will in turn create solutions for these challenges by developing their own software applications.
On day two, September 9, each participant will present their solutions.
The group or individual with the best solution will represent Dominica at the regional Agrihack Talent Caribbean Competition which will be held during the Caribbean Week Of Agriculture in Suriname from October 6 to 12 2014.
The winner of the competition will receive 5,000 Euros and will receive six months training as well as the technical expertise to further develop their software.
The second place will receive 4,000 Euros and 3,000 Euros will go to the third place winner.
Nicolas continued, “What this means for the individuals is that it’s going to provide an avenue for them to seek business opportunities. This is because you are not just coding and moving on, you’re defining a solution, interacting with investors, interact with other business professionals, interacting with agricultural professionals. This means that you are seeing the dynamics in motion, everybody is interacting with each other and coming together to define a solution and it means that after this event there will be more to come, it means other persons are aware of your talent, aware of what you can do and they will seek you out.”
Teams or individuals wishing to participate in this event can report to the grounds of the Dominica State College on September 6, 2014 or contact Veronne Nicolas at the Dominica State College.