Innovation and collaboration — key to reach the SDGs
Just over a week to go until I travel to Denmark to participate in the 2017 UNLEASH LAB as an SDG Talent. For those of you unfamiliar with UNLEASH, it’s a global innovation lab that brings together young people from all over the world to transform their personal ideas and insights into concrete and lasting solutions around the Sustainable Development Goals. Why do I participate? Well, because I believe that collective action and innovation are key to reach the SDGs.
I am Lonneke Noteboom, a 23-year old, born and raised in The Netherlands. While The Netherlands is my home, the African continent is where the heart is. While this sounds cheesy, it is also true. Having had the privilege to study in South Africa, travel across Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Namibia and Uganda, and visit Rwanda and Tanzania for work related purposes, I can say that I enjoyed every single visit. Each country has its own distinctive features, with its own history, people and institutions. Yet, what seems to be a commonality across the places I have seen is their entrepreneurial spirit. The first time this occurred to me was in South Africa, where I got to know mobile financial services: a so-called ‘leapfrog technology’ that brings financial services to the many underserved across the continent. Inspired by the innovative use of mobile phones, I decided to write my bachelor thesis on these pocket-banks. Under the guidance of the former Dutch minister of Development, Jan Pronk, I looked at the effect of mobile financial services in three different African countries. My conclusion: a tremendous opportunity for development.
What followed was a Master’s degree in African Development at the London School of Economics. A year full of discussions around the history of the continent; the challenges and opportunities around agriculture and industry; various forms of governance; humanitarian assistance; and of course the MDGs and SDGs. Upon completion of my degree, I continued working in the spirit of innovative financial services. I started at FMO, the Dutch development bank, to develop their Financial Technology (Fintech) strategy. This meant looking at the various ways in which FMO could use Fintech solutions to bring financial services to smallholder farmers, micro- and small enterprises, and women-owned businesses. Personally, I see FinTech is a powerful tool to achieve several of the SDGs. Generally, increasing the access to finance plays a crucial role in the economic development of emerging economies, allowing individuals and businesses to invest in their future (Goal 1); individuals to afford health care (Goal 3) and education (Goal 4); women to access finance (Goal 5); businesses to expand (Goal 8 and 9); and the un- and underbanked low-income segments of the population to access finance (Goal 10). I am currently part of FMO’s Fintech team, with whom I am implementing the Fintech strategy. In my daily work I have the honour to meet so many inspiring entrepreneurs, who really want to bring the African continent forward by making use of innovate solutions.
UNLEASH LAB provides the perfect opportunity to engage with many more entrepreneurs and like-minded young and creative people who want to bring change to this world. The amount of talent that UNLEASH managed to attract is truly inspiring. I therefore hope to learn from everyone’s experiences, and co-create solutions together. In that process, the voice and experience from African countries is absolutely crucial in order to develop solutions that fit the context in which they have to be implemented. I am happy to be among talented minds from across the globe to create lasting solutions around the SDGs during UNLEASH. In order to reach the goals by 2030, innovation and collaboration are key. Let’s make that happen, together.
Lonneke
