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Ideas

Summary: Our community problems are shouted into the void of social media and radio call-ins. There is no structured way for the government to see which problems matter most to the people. The Problem: How can a local council know that a broken water pipe in one community is a higher priority than a pothole in another? How can citizens collectively signal to the government what needs to be fixed first?

Summary: Sierra Leone's information landscape is fractured across social media, creating a breeding ground for viral misinformation and unchecked cyber scams. Citizens lack a centralised tool to verify what is true or report digital threats, leading to public confusion and financial loss. The Problem: If you receive a viral WhatsApp message about a new law or health warning, how do you know if it's true without knowing someone in the government? Where does a victim of fraud go to instantly report? How can the police track real-time cyber threats if citizens have no easy way to log incidents?

Summary: Verifying a university degree or professional certificate is a slow, manual process that is easy to cheat with fake documents. This allows unqualified people to get important jobs. The Problem: How can an employer be sure that a job applicant's certificate is real without waiting weeks for the university to respond to an email? How can we stop the proliferation of fake degrees that devalue the hard work of honest graduates?

Summary: Our youth are choosing their career paths blind, with no real data on which jobs are actually in demand. This is creating a massive skills mismatch that fuels unemployment. The Problem: How can a student in secondary school know which university course is most likely to lead to a job? How can they discover careers they've never even heard of? How do we stop training thousands of people for jobs that don't exist?

Summary: Government decision-making is hampered by manual, inefficient administrative processes. Lost sign-in sheets and delayed meeting minutes lead to a lack of accountability regarding attendance and confusion over critical action items. The Problem: How can we hold officials accountable if the paper attendance log is missing or illegible? Why do critical decisions fall through the cracks because minutes are distributed weeks late? How can a ministry operate effectively without a single, immediate source of truth for what was decided and who is responsible?

Summary: We have a crisis of substance abuse among our youth and a crisis of civic neglect in our communities. We can solve both by creating a system that offers a pathway to recovery through productive community work. The Problem: How do we give individuals struggling with addiction a low-barrier first step towards recovery? How can we fund such a program sustainably? How can we change public perception from seeing these individuals as a burden to seeing them as a potential workforce?

Summary: Dangerous health misinformation spreads like wildfire, while our clinics are overwhelmed with people asking basic questions. We need a trusted, 24/7 source for health information in a language people understand. The Problem: When a mother's child has a fever, where can she get immediate, trustworthy advice? How do we stop the spread of dangerous rumors during a health crisis? How can we free up our nurses' time to deal with serious cases instead of answering routine questions?

Summary: There is no simple, transparent, or efficient way for a citizen to file a complaint against a government official or ministry. The current paper-based system is a black hole that destroys accountability. The Problem: If a citizen in a rural area wants to report a public official for malpractice, why should they have to spend money and travel for hours to do so? Once a complaint is filed, how can they track its status? How can the Ombudsman's office spot patterns of corruption in a specific ministry if all records are on paper?

Summary: Our most important life documents—birth certificates, property deeds, degrees—exist only as fragile pieces of paper. They are constantly at risk of being lost, stolen, or destroyed, which creates profound insecurity. The Problem: What happens if a house fire destroys your family's only copy of a land title? How can you prove your qualifications if your original degree certificate is lost? How much of our national history and identity is trapped in vulnerable paper archives?

Summary: Thousands of our qualified youth are being rejected for jobs simply because they don't know how to write a professional CV. This "application gap" is a massive, invisible barrier to employment. The Problem: How can a recent graduate translate their university experience into a compelling CV that an employer will notice? How do we help them get past the automated screening systems that filter out poorly formatted applications?

Summary: An integrated digital system for managing facility access, visitor and vehicle entry, meeting room bookings, and public appointments with officials — all from one unified platform. Problem: Government offices face inefficiency and congestion from manual visitor logs, disconnected appointment processes, and unclear schedules for meeting rooms or officials. Citizens struggle to schedule meetings transparently, while staff waste time managing schedules manually.

Summary: The diaspora is eager to invest in Sierra Leone's future, but they are blocked by high fees, currency risk, and a lack of trusted, vetted opportunities. Our best youth-led businesses are starved of capital as a result. The Problem: How can an investor in London send $500 to a startup in Freetown without losing a chunk to fees? How can they be sure their investment won't lose value overnight due to currency fluctuations? How can they discover and perform due diligence on credible, investment-ready businesses from thousands of miles away?

Summary: A student's transcript is a flat, one-dimensional document. It doesn't show their real-world skills, making it hard for them to stand out to employers. The Problem: How can a graduate prove to an employer that they have excellent teamwork skills from a class project? How can they showcase the data analysis they did for their dissertation? How can an employer find the best entry-level talent when all CVs look the same?

Summary: It is incredibly difficult to verify if a business is legitimate and legally registered in Sierra Leone. This lack of transparency enables fraud and slows down the entire economy. The Problem: How can a consumer be sure that an online business is real before sending them money? How can a bank quickly perform due diligence on a small business applying for a loan? How can a foreign investor verify a potential local partner?