Nine students from different African universities were winners of a competition on nuclear energy.
Namibian students also took part in the sixth annual competition organised by the Russian state Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom.
The winners of the online video competition is titled ‘Atoms Empowering Africa’ were announced at the special online awards ceremony this week.
During the competition, participants were to post videos on Facebook exploring nuclear technologies and how these could be utilised to benefit Africa.
These could include how nuclear technologies can assist in achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in Africa, how nuclear technologies can help developing countries industrialise, how non-power related nuclear science and technology can benefit countries or communities.
This year’s winners are the team of George Davis Bilali, a student at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Ghana who is originally from Tanzania. His counterparts are Alyaa Mahmoud Ibrahim Awad from Egypt and Fati Aruna Akoriko from Ghana.
The other winners are Mostafa Omran, a masters student at the African Centre of Excellence in Future Energies and Electrochemical Systems in Egypt and Noоmen Noоmen, a student and communication manager at Panorama short film in Tunisia.
A special prize for best collaboration was established for three other participants because of the diversity of the work.
This went to the team of Munachimso Oguine, Oguine Jane and Oguine Ozioma from the National Open University of Nigeria.
Another special prize for extraordinary creativity and video content was awarded to Wissem Dallali, from Tunisia.
All winners will go on an all-expenses paid trip to Russia, where they will visit several tourist attractions as well as various nuclear institutions and facilities.
One of the judges, the national executive chairperson of the South African Young Nuclear Professional Society Gaopalelwe Santswere said this year there were high-quality of videos.
“Courageous, smart, creative young specialists are the key to success in the development of Africa,” Santswere added.
Another judge Tebogo Motlhabane, president of Women in Nuclear South Africa, said many girls took part in the competition.
“This is also very important for the development of nuclear science,” she added.
The chief executive officer and Founder of Influence Communications, Mohamed Emara said a large number of videos show that the youth of Africa are eager to achieve sustainable development goals to solve the continent’s problems.
“These begin from pressing medical problems to climate change. A key factor of mankind’s steady future is obtaining energy without pollution, and it’s the value of nuclear energy,” Emara stated.
According to Ryan Collyer, the chief executive officer of Rosatom in the Central and Southern Africa, nuclear technology is the heart of many innovations from which Africa and the world can benefit.
He said the company is ready to support African youth’s aspirations in achieving their purposes.
“It is important for us that talented young people prove themselves. Our activity is not limited to construction of the nuclear power plant, we (Rosatom corporation) are also many-sided, as well as you are, therefore our purpose is to help you to study, to reveal, to develop and be useful to society,” he explained.