Sanergy Collaborative Honoured as Semifinalist of 2022 Urban Innovative Challenge by Utopia & World Economic Forum's Urban Transformation Platform

The Sanergy Collaborative co-founder David Auerbach outside the offices on September 21, 2022.
The Sanergy Collaborative co-founder David Auerbach outside the offices on September 21, 2022.
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The Sanergy Collaborative

The Sanergy Collaborative has been honoured as one of the 16 semifinalists in the 2022 Urban Innovation Challenge by Utopia and the World Economic Forum’s Urban Transformation Platform.

The challenge highlighted leading innovators across eight fast-growing cities in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The Sanergy Collaborative was recognised for its innovative 3 step circular economy model - empowering cities to build systems for safely managed sanitation in low-income areas, delivery of professional waste management services and upcycling of waste for the manufacture of safe agricultural inputs and biofuels. 

Nearly all of the world’s urban growth is taking place in fast-growing cities across Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Entrepreneurs are playing an increasingly important role in building decentralized solutions to improve the quality of living across all systems in their cities.

With a large percentage of the population living in urban areas, booming cities are experiencing challenges of both inadequate housing and limited access to basic services such as safe sanitation and waste management. 

Sanergy waste collectors during the daily pick-ups on June 19, 2012.
Sanergy waste collectors during the daily pick-ups on June 19, 2012.
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The Sanergy Collaborative

The Sanergy Collaborative, through its two founding partners Fresh Life and Regen Organics, inspires a sustainable, climate-smart circular economy revolution for today’s booming cities in Kenya. 

Fresh Life provides high-quality, secure, and long-term non-sewered sanitation solutions in difficult-to-reach, low-income urban communities, while Regen Organics manufactures regenerative clean energy and agricultural inputs such as organic fertilizers and insect-based protein for animal feed through converting organic waste collected in cities and their environs. 

Sanergy Collaborative serves more than 200,000 urban residents with safe sanitation and guarantees that 100% of the waste removed is safely managed. In addition, more than 10,000 farmers using its agricultural inputs see upwards of 30% increase in yields. Collectively, Sanergy Collaborative offsets nearly 50,000 tons of CO2 annually, mitigating climate change.

Utopia and the World Economic Forum’s Urban Transformation platform partnered on an Urban Innovation Challenge to highlight the growth of startups that can improve the quality of life for local residents and mitigate social and environmental challenges associated with rapid urbanization. 

Participating cities included Bogotá, Buenos Aires, Lagos, Dhaka, Jakarta, Kigali, Nairobi, and Rio de Janeiro. “We are honored to have emerged as one of the 16 semifinalists championing sustainable solutions and building innovative approaches to improve the quality of lives. 

This recognition is a reinforcement of our commitment to reimagine and address the sanitation gap while addressing food security by building a prosperous, climate-smart agriculture sector through a circular economy approach. 

Through collaborations with governments, non-governmental organizations and key industry partners, we will scale this model to create a thriving ecosystem ultimately contributing to a more sustainable and regenerative world,” David Auerbach, The Sanergy Collaborative Co-Founder. “Cities of the Majority World across Asia, Africa, and Latin America are the arenas where the next era of humanity will be built. 

They’re where the vast majority of citizens will live and where the most important decisions will be made about what our societies and our planet becomes,” said Jonathan Hursh, Founding Partner of Utopia.

AFresh Life operator holding the new design urine diverting squat plate in Nairobi on March 6, 2019,
AFresh Life operator holding the new design urine diverting squat plate in Nairobi on March 6, 2019.
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The Sanergy Collaborative