Grassroots initiatives from Bangladesh to Zimbabwe are the Gold Winners of the 2009 SEED Awards

Nairobi, 10 November 2009 - Outstanding social and environmental projects from Zimbabwe, Bangladesh, Colombia, Southern Africa, India and Niger are the winners of the 2009 SEED Gold Awards, the SEED Initiative announced today.

The prize recognizes promising, locally driven start-up enterprises that work in developing countries to improve livelihoods, tackle poverty and manage natural resources sustainably.

The five 2009 Gold Winners, selected by an international jury among this year's twenty SEED Award winners, are:

• An association of small-scale women farmers in Zimbabwe who are striving to reverse severe land degradation through organic farming;
• A Bangladeshi NGO that has developed a low-cost solar lantern made from recycled parts of the kerosene lantern;
• An association in Colombia that has set environmental standards for local miners;
• Civil society organizations in Southern Africa and India that are developing bio-cultural protocols;
• And institutions in Niger that have developed sustainable solid waste management systems to keep cities clean.

Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary-General and UNEP Executive Director, said: "The SEED Gold Winners show us that a low carbon, resource efficient Green Economy is as much a developing country and rural community issue as it is a developed country one. These genuinely inspiring initiatives are generating multiple economic, social and environmental benefits and being achieved often against enormous odds. The challenge now is to scale them up."

All the SEED Gold Winners will be given their award at in-country award ceremonies. Rather than the traditional monetary prize, they will receive individually-tailored business and partnership support services, worth US$ 35,000, for up to one year to help them become established and increase their impact. This includes access to relevant expertise and technical assistance, meeting new partners and building networks, developing business plans and identifying sources of finance.

The specific nature of the support is decided by each winner, hence tuning it to local needs - SEED helps locate and provide the services required, drawing mainly on local know-how and expertise and well as national and international networks.

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