App for Uganda against Hidden Hunger

Students4Kids: About 80 teams have submitted a project idea to this year’s competition of Students4Kids. The jury decided that your project is among the best. What do you think makes your project so special?

Merve Osmanbeyoglu: Modern technologies – smartphones in particular – are rapidly spreading in Uganda. We believe there is a lot of potential here, which is why our project wants to use technology to optimize helping those in need. After the idea gets implemented, it can also be used in other countries with similar problems. There’s a lot of room for further development.

Hidden hunger is a problem with far-reaching consequences and a variety of causes. How did you come up with your specific idea against hidden hunger in Uganda?

Problems are there to be solved! Hidden hunger is an unresolved problem in Uganda. We both study mathematics and informatics and are convinced that there’s a solution to every problem – including the one mentioned above. We desperately searched for an overview of aid projects during our research, but couldn’t find one. Now it’s up to us to create one ourselves!

You have until August 26th to work out your idea to a finished concept. What’s the work on that like for you? Are you all working together on the concept or have you for example split up the different tasks?

Since we live in two different cities, we decided to distribute the tasks, use shared documents online, and constantly talk on the phone to keep each other up to speed. There are times where we find ourselves in heated discussions and time consuming conflicts, but we always manage to find solutions to our problems.

The winning team of the Students4Kids competition will receive 10,000 euros as start-up funding for their project. What exactly would you do with the money?

The 10,000 Euros will be used for implementing the project idea. When our start-up funding is used up, we will have developed an app that is known and used by the population and aid organizations. And obviously we have to travel to Africa.

You have done a lot of research on the topic of hidden hunger. What did you learn that you may not have known before? What do you think everyone should know about the phenomenon?

We were surprised to learn that hidden hunger isn’t only connected to poverty in Uganda. Whether people have a well-balanced diet also depends on their education. We believe that everyone should learn that hunger isn’t only dangerous when your stomach feels empty. Humanity has to thoroughly deal with hidden hunger and come up with solutions to fight it.