Battle Climate Change with IFA
John Toner, co-founder of Information for Action, was named a finalist in the Singularity University Global Impact competition to fight Climate Change on April 14, 2017. The contest reviewed over 100 applicants, 10 of whom were invited to pitch their concept to battle climate change. Ideas ranged from making Algae more palatable, allowing people to crowd-fund solar panels, and using machine learning to weed out counterfeit seeds in Kenya.
John promoted IFA’s vision to turn every article about climate change into an opportunity to purchase environmentally sustainable products or join movements to improve the environment. The IFA platform, he argued, can be the engine for a paradigm shift in how we consume online content to align our values with market offerings:
What would happen if we started voting with our wallet and supporting environmentally sustainable products every time we read about the de-funding of the EPA, lack of leadership by government agencies, or the latest environmental catastrophe by an oil company? The IFA platform will exponentially increase the marketability of eco-friendly product lines. This is what we’re working to achieve – community and values-driven change.
For more information about this vision, please contact John at j.toner@informationforaction.org.
Global Impact Challenge
More information about the GIC from Singularity University:
The 2017 SingularityU San Francisco Global Impact Challenge (SF GIC 2017) is an open call to entrepreneurs, technologists, designers, inventors, scientists and other experts from all disciplines with the most innovative ideas for moonshot innovations that have the potential to positively impact millions of people within 10 years. The winner of the challenge receives a full sponsorship to attend the transformational Global Solutions Program (GSP).
This year, for the first time, we are ideally looking for applicants who have the skills and passion to develop a moonshot idea and launch a startup company that addresses climate change, although we will also accept outstanding applicants who have other areas of expertise or choose to innovate in other fields.
Climate change is a broad focus area that includes many areas ripe for innovation. For example, if you’re developing sustainable food sources or alternative energy sources, developing governance models for policy, or focused on issues such as biodiversity or water access, you already fall within the climate change theme and should definitely apply.
