February 6, 2011

Vote Now for Your Favorite App in World Bank Competition

The World Bank announced on 31 January 2011 that it has opened public voting on the applications submitted to the Apps for Development Competition, a challenge issued to software developers by the World Bank to get new perspectives in identifying solutions to development problems. The Popular Choice Award will be determined by public vote and the winner will receive a cash award and a feature on the World Bank website. The competition is part of the Bank’s Open Data Initiative, which last year released for free and for the first time the Bank’s catalogue of development data.

Applications were submitted from 36 countries across every continent with more than half came from Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The apps use a wide variety of World Bank data, including information about health, the environment, children out of school, agricultural land data, gender statistics, population growth, and mortality rate, among other datasets. The 107 apps came in response to the World Bank’s global call for apps in October 2010 to help find solutions to today's development challenges and to raise awareness of the Millennium Development Goals.

The 107 eligible entries are now available for use, review and voting on the Apps for Development website through 28 February 2011. The apps created range from SMS services to apps for the Apple iPhone, and include games aimed at children, as well as educational and statistical modeling tools. The winners will be announced at the joint World Bank/International Monetary Fund Spring Meetings in April 2011.

Aside from the Popular Choice Award, an expert judging panel will select winners for the First, Second, and Third Prizes, five Honorable Mentions, and a Large Organization Recognition Award. A total of $45,000 is available in prizes. The expert judging panel includes such technology gurus as Craig Newmark of Craigslist, Kannan Pashupathy from Google, and Ory Okolloh, co-founder of Ushahidi. Apps were also submitted by large technology companies, although these cannot be considered for prizes.

So go ahead, vote for your favorite and share in the comment section below what which app you voted for and why.

1 comment:

  1. Some of the apps are pretty original. Take a look at this one:

    http://appsfordevelopment.challengepost.com/challenges/78/submissions/1507-save-the-rain-rain-water-productivity-calculator

    You can zoom to your house, no matter where it is in the world, draw a box over the roof and the app will tell how much rain you could save in a year. Even how many basic crops you could grow. Very useful for developing countries struggling with water shortages.

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