Star College High learners Kiaran Chetty and Calden Gounden will represent South Africa in Stockholm, Sweden, at the Annual Stockholm Junior Youth Water Prize (SJWP) at the end of August.
The pair from Star College High in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, were announced as the winners of the 20th National South African Youth Water Prize Competition (SAYWP).
This follows their impressive innovation that went to the core of modernising water resource management efforts in the country.
The competition, which took place in Gauteng from 16 – 17 May 2019, saw learners from all over the country fight it out to impress adjudicators on innovations relating to water and sanitation.
The SAYWP is a Science and Technology based project and is coordinated by the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS). The project started at provincial level and progressed to the national competition, where the winners were crowned.
One of the aims of the project is to promote the protection of natural resources and to encourage youth to actively participate in integrated and community based water resource management.
Their project, the Hydro-Conservation, intends to reduce the quantity of water that is wasted in households across South Africa daily during showering and handwashing.
In Stockholm, the winners will showcase their innovation, which will compete with those of other learners from 30 other countries around the world.
DWS Chief Director for Water Services and Local Water Management, Rex Mtileni, said the competition was a means of investing in young people so that they pursue careers in the water and sanitation sector.
“To date, there are about 342 schools that have participated in the competition. As a result of this, we now have 42 graduates who are now contributing to develop our country and 29 other young people are in tertiary across the country where they are pursuing careers in the water and sanitation sector,” said Mtileni.
