SafariShare · 10 December 2021 · 2 min read
SafariShare has been named one of ten winners of the AFD Digital Challenge 2021.
The AFD Digital Challenge is the annual competition run by the Agence Française de Développement to recognise African digital startups driving measurable impact on climate and biodiversity. This fifth edition focused specifically on environmental goals. We were selected from hundreds of applicants across Africa.
The case we made was built on two years of trip data.
Since launching in December 2019, SafariShare has filled over 7,000 empty seats in private cars, facilitated 600,000 kilometres of shared journeys, and avoided an estimated 1,200 tons of CO2 emissions. Sharing a journey with two other passengers reduces greenhouse gas emissions by approximately 8 kilograms per trip. Aggregated across thousands of completed trips, carpooling is a concrete climate intervention.
The case is straightforward: filling empty seats in private cars with passengers heading in the same direction delivers both environmental and economic benefits through the same mechanism. That is what we submitted, and the AFD recognised it.
Being on the AFD's validated list puts SafariShare in a different conversation with development finance institutions, climate-focused investors, and government partners. That matters in a sector where credibility with international partners is hard to build from Kampala without a track record they can verify.
It also matters internally. Two years of building through a pandemic, through the slow work of growing supply on a peer-to-peer marketplace, deserves to be acknowledged somewhere beyond our own spreadsheets. This is that acknowledgement.
The recognition does not change the work. Uganda's intercity transport problem is still there. The supply-demand balance on the platform still needs attention. We are still a relatively young company with a lot to build.
What it changes is the context. SafariShare is now part of a network of AFD-recognised startups working on climate solutions across Africa. The conversations that come from that network will shape what the platform becomes.
We are grateful, and we are focused.