Pakistani project wins award

Islamabad

A project from Pakistan has won the first award in the Global Development Award Competition 2016 for the ‘Most Innovative Development Project’ in the world.

‘Broadclass-Listen to Learn’ by POWER99 Foundation, Pakistan qualified among the three finalists from around the world out of 271 submissions from 59 developing countries. Other finalists included ‘Garbage Clinical Insurance, by Indonesia Medika, Indonesia and Vegetable Value Chain by Mountain Societies Development Support Programme, Kargystan.

The award competition through Global Development Network (GDN) received 337 expression of interest from 59 developing countries and finally, 271 submissions were accepted. After a rigorous multi-stage review process three finalists were chosen to compete for the innovative development award category at GDN’s 17th Annual Global Development Conference held in Peru in March 2016; an event attended by over 200 practitioners in the field of development.

Supported by UK Aid, the award winning project focuses on improving learning quality of school children in the early grades in numeracy, recognition of colours and objects, writing and speaking skills the pilot project used a unique idea of combining radio broadcasts with interactive class room activities.

Implemented by Power99 Foundation (Pakistan) in Haripur district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, the project involved 8,860 children of 165 schools, 4370 members of parents and community members and 591 teachers and government officials for a duration of 18 months during 2014 and 2015.