Five students from St Paul’s University are in the US to compete for this year’s Hult Prize competition finals, which started on Monday at the Clinton Global Initiative in New York City.

Besides the five, dubbed Eco-Bana, other finalists in the Sh120 million Hult Prize include Cooseii (Taiwan), Breer (Hong Kong), Savvy Engineers (Pakistan) and Openversum (Switzerland.

Reputable personalities expected to grace the event include former US President Bill Clinton, who will deliver the keynote speech, and Lori Van Dam, the chief executive of Hult Prize.

The competition challenges university students to come up with solutions to pressing social issues through entrepreneurship, and also provide employment to 2,000 people by 2024.

The five Kenyan students are Lennox Omondi (chief operation officer), Keylie Muthoni (chief financial officer), Brian Ndung’u (chief communication and marketing officer), Dullah Shilton (chief financial officer) and Emanuel Omondi (chief technical officer).

Conserve environment

The students conceived an idea that could help conserve the environment, end period poverty, create employment to the youth, and provide affordable sanitary towels.

To end period poverty, Eco-Bana envisages manufacture of biodegradable, eco-friendly and hygienic sanitary towels in place of plastic towels.

The raw materials will be directly sourced from the environment, making it easier for the sanitary towels to decompose once disposed and hence conserving Mother Nature.

Eco-Bana addresses three Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), including good health and wellbeing, by manufacturing these hygienic towels.

The group also address the SDG goal of decent work and economic growth by giving the innovation monetary value, and the goals of climate action by manufacturing biodegradable goods.

Muthoni explains: “Another thing that stands out with this innovation is the fact that once the girls and women purchase the (Eco-Bana) towels, they will not necessarily have to dispose them since they are reusable after washing. This favours financially-challenged school girls and women.”

Best 2022 project

Last week, Eco-Bana clinched the 2022 Best Innovative Project at the Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) Awards held at Kenya Education Management Institute (KEMI) in Parklands, Nairobi, organised by Africa for SDGs.

“Winning is something that builds up physically and mentally every day; that you train for every day and dream about every night,” Emanuel Omondi remarks.

On May 14, this year, Eco-Bana scooped the first position in the Hult Prize Regional Summit held in Johannesburg, South Africa. This later helped them secure a slot in the Global Accelerator fete hosted in Massachusetts, Boston, USA.

And on July 21, this year, Eco-Bana emerged third overall — and first in the students category — in the Kiambu County Innovation Day, hosted at Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture Technology (JKUAT).

University input

St Paul’s University has supported the innovation in many ways, including registering Eco-Bana as a company, and inviting local and international investors.

“As a university, we also partner with Eco-Bana — we mentor them, provide constant motivation and counseling, and help them secure their visas and passports, among other benefit,” says Michael Mungai.

The team’s patron adds: “On May 19 this year, the team clinched first position in the Kenya Climate Innovation Centre Competition held at Strathmore University, which saw them pocket Sh900,000, several certificates and a free incubation programme.”