Cases
Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, Côte d'Ivoire

Support to design the Afriplastics Challenge to Tackle Marine Plastic Waste in Africa

Commissioned by Nesta

01 Situation

Sub-Saharan Africa generates over 17 million tonnes of waste annually, yet only 12% of plastic is recycled. Marine ecosystems are under threat, as mismanaged plastic continues to pollute coastal and inland waters. To address this, Nesta Challenges—funded by the Canadian government—launched an Innovation Challenge to reduce marine plastics through scalable, inclusive solutions that empower women and girls across the region.

02 Assignment

Following a competitive international tender, Nesta selected Proportion Global to lead design research across Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, and Côte d’Ivoire. The goal: deeply understand the barriers and ambitions of African innovators working to prevent plastic pollution and use this insight to design three targeted challenge prizes.

03 Approach

Proportion assembled a pan-African research team of local HCD experts. Together, they conducted ecosystem mapping, identified high-impact innovators, and led in-depth interviews with entrepreneurs and system actors. Synthesised insights informed challenge prize prototypes, which were then validated through iterative feedback loops with users.

04 Result

Three challenge strands were launched: recycling innovators, zero-waste/circular economy solutions, and consumer behaviour change initiatives. Proportion’s contribution was so well-received that they were retained through sole sourcing to lead the innovation support programme for 70 semi-finalists and 35 finalists across the region.

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