---
id: "govlab:project/mcc-africa"
type: "GovLab project"
title: "The Multi City Challenge Africa"
url: "https://thegovlab.org/project/mcc-africa"
authors: ["Frederico Levy","Victoria Alsina","Sam DeJohn","Jason Williams-Bellamy","Anirudh Dinesh"]
summary: "The Multi-City Challenge is a process by which cities pool expertise from their residents to discover and implement innovative solutions to contemporary urban problems."
source: "The GovLab (thegovlab.org)"
licence: "Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)"
---

# The Multi City Challenge Africa

The Multi-City Challenge is a process by which cities pool expertise from their residents to discover and implement innovative solutions to contemporary urban problems.

Project website: [https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/](https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/)

## Background

As more people move into urban areas, cities face growing challenges from road congestion and pollution to public health and inequality. The Multi-City Challenge is a process by which cities pool expertise from their residents to discover and implement innovative solutions to contemporary urban problems/

The Multi-City Challenge combines: 1) training for public servants to define problems with data and evidence with 2) an open innovation competition to source solutions and then 3) a coaching program for residents and public servants to develop those solutions collaboratively into implementable new policies and services.

## Description

The GovLab is currently running a Multi City Challenge ([https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/](https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/)) in partnership with UNDP with residents in [Accra](https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/cities/accra.html) (1.5 million inhabitants), Ghana; [Bahir Dar](https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/cities/bahir-dar.html) (750,991 inhabitants), Ethiopia; [Kampala](https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/cities/kampala.html) (1.5 million inhabitants), Uganda; [Kano](https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/cities/kano.html) (4 million inhabitants), Nigeria and [Mutare](https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/cities/mutare.html) (262,124 inhabitants), Zimbabwe. to address: digitizing the informal economy, building urban resilience, and improving waste management. During September and October, we conducted eight training sessions for public officials of the participating cities on problem definition and open innovation to enable participatory policymaking. With the support of our [advisory board](https://africa.multicitychallenge.org/advisory-board.html) of African engagement experts, we are now running the open innovation challenge between now and December 13.

## Team

- [Frederico Levy](https://thegovlab.org/team.html#NULL)
- [Victoria Alsina](https://thegovlab.org/team.html#victoria-alsina)
- [Sam DeJohn](https://thegovlab.org/team.html#sam-dejohn)
- [Jason Williams-Bellamy](https://thegovlab.org/team.html#jason-williams-bellamy)
- [Anirudh Dinesh](https://thegovlab.org/team.html#anirudh-dinesh)

## Additional resources

- [Promotional Video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JhjgZk3yTA&feature=youtu.be)
- [Make Kampala better! How can we build urban resilience and integrate the informal economy?](https://www.ug.undp.org/content/uganda/en/home/presscenter/pressreleases/2020/make-kampala-better--how-can-we-build-urban-resilience-and-integ.html)