ECOTECH (Ecology Technology)

ECOTECH is out to build smart bins that reduce the spread of the coronavirus and solves climate change.

Smart bin is the solution ECOTECH is giving to reduce the spread of the coronavirus and solve climate change. Firstly, ECOTECH has built an electronic smart dustbin that prevents contact with its users by opening and closing automatically when it senses the presence of a user. This dustbin allows the user to dispose of waste without touching or having any physical contact with the dustbin. Secondly, ECOTECH used this Smart bin technology to design a waste monitoring and control system to solve climate change. This system is about locating dustbins that are full and signaling waste agencies. The Smart bin composes of a monitoring sensor that uses an AI algorithm to monitor the level of waste in the dustbin. The Smart dustbin then uses the Internet of Things (IoT) to communicate with a map application built by ECOTECH, where all the data is analysed. When the bin is full, the waste collectors are signalled by our application and the location of the bin is given.

Climate change is real; the rising of temperatures, rising and falling of sea tides, changes in seasons, increments in our monthly and annual rainfall is now daily action. It is estimated that by the year 2030, Africa will be over 1.6 billion in population, and the coronavirus has proven to us not well-prepared for what is coming; populated markets, unsecured homes, hospitals are not well-taken care of to limit the spread of the virus. Cameroon reported 299 new cases tested positive for the coronavirus on the 10th of January 2022. Our research shows that all public institutions protect their equipment except the dustbins: an easier medium to contract the virus. Let us turn from corona to climate change; waste mismanagement is one of the fundamental causes of climate change in Africa. Sub-saharan Africa of over 1 billion people produced 81 million tons of waste in 2012, with 80% disposed of openly. Poor waste disposal and management are one of the main causes of climate change in Africa. Cameroon's single waste collector, HYSACAM, collected 600,000 tons of waste in 2019-2020, with over 90% of this amount disposed of openly. In 2021, HYSACAM reported collecting 1000 tons of waste per day in Yaounde, Cameroon's Capital. HYSACAM is trying to solve the dustbin flooding problem: one of the reasons is waste is disposed of openly. Waste collectors and recyclers are facing a problem identifying dustbins that are full and their locations. 

Waste agencies, waste collectors, and waste recyclers have been looking for solutions to overcome the dustbin flooding problem. Public institutions, health infrastructures, and private individuals have also been looking for methods to secure themselves 100%. That is why ECOTECH is here with smart bins technology. ECOTECH has segmented its products into two parts: the Smart bins for COVID-19 and the Smart bins for climate change. Our target customers for the smart bins for climate change are waste agencies, collectors, and recyclers suffering from the pain of locating full dustbins. Our target customers for the smart bins for COVID-19 are private and public institutions, health infrastructures, and individuals suffering from the pain of fully securing themselves from contracting the coronavirus.

Before we thought there was no problem then we had to read a paper on HYSACAM's website (The number-one waste collector in Cameroon) saying "we are facing a huge problem overcoming the dustbin overflooding problem coupled with the current growing population". Then we visited HYSACAM and we interviewed them and this one of their fascinating response, "yeah we face a problem in finding full dustbins around, that is why sometimes the dustbins have to overflow for weeks before we empty them". We also approach about three recycling companies in Cameroon and all their responses were the same as HYSACAM then we concluded there was a big problem. We had the suggestion that dustbins could be an actual path to contract the coronavirus, but we just did random interviews of people to get their suggestion, 70% of the people said "when using dustbins we feel exposed to the virus because we always have to touch the bin no matter how". Some kids even told us "they wish they had superpowers to open bins without touching them". This is the data that encourage us to build the Smart bins tech to overcome the dual problems.

Since ECOTECH's products are segmented, one of our products is already on testing, and the other is still in prototyping, but soon be done. The Smart bin for COVID-19 is already functional and we are testing the product with one of our users. the video link of the testing will be shared with SOLVE. Based on the second since it is much bulkier than the other, but thanks to SOLVE's micro-grant support we aim to finish it in three months.

The backbone of the Smart bin technology is Robotics, IoT (Internet of Things), AI, and software. Robotics comes in building the mechanical and electrical hardware of the bin. AI comes in programming the intelligence of the dustbin. IoT comes where the dustbin has to communicate with the software built by ECOTECH to assist in the monitoring of the waste level of the dustbin. The dustbin uses an IoT hardware Module to communicate with the software. The Software part helps to collect data from the bin like the GPS data and the sensor readings of the level of waste in the dustbin.

The Smart bin for COVID-19 will serve approximately +5,000,000 individuals and  100 private and public hospitals in Cameroon. The Smart bin for Climate change is projected to serve the largest waste collection company and 10 recycling companies in Cameroon.

ECOTECH’s goal is to create a waste monitoring system for climate change. We aim to use multiple technologies to accomplish this, but our success lies in the acceptance and implementation of the smart bin for climate change. The smart bins is one of the technologies that will power this waste monitoring system for climate change. By next year, we aim to be monitoring the amount of exposed waste over Africa and how we can mitigate it. By next year, we also look forward that our project is implemented all over Africa and extended to other parts of the world.

We plan to measure our impact based on the number of our users. Our indicators are from our online sales, direct producer-customer sales, subsidiary sales agents, warehousing. With these indicators, we will be able to know the number of our users.

having our project at hand we face financial limitations for the implementation of the project and also the legalization of our project. We also lack enough and adequate expertise in the team, thus limiting our work. We also lack expertise in the marketing of our product. Above all, we see SOLVE as a stepping stone to make our dreams a reality.

My team has always been called a team because of teamwork. We started as a team when we were in our fifth year in secondary school and that’s where we started targeting real problems. We have been working together for five years; we started ECOTECH and the smart bins project together and we have been working on it for 2 years. We have attended previous challenges both nationally and internationally in which stood out greatly. My team is very diversified when it comes to talent. We are made up of programmers, engineers, project managers and secretaries. A year ago, we took part in two innovation hubs in Cameroon, one a product designing and manufacturing company and another a youth-promoting and Technological company. We are in partnership with 4 tech organizations. Presently, we are volunteering in a mobile application designing and production company in Cameroon. By working with all these technology organizations, we have learned to work as a team on our projects in a well-organized manner and productively. Also, we benefit from all these organizations we work with since they help and mentor us when we are working on our projects.

To successfully build and complete our projects, ECOTECH is in partnership with the following organizations,

• Game Changers Initiative (a waste management initiative), TIC (Tech Innovation Centers), MATECAM (Matrix Technology Cameroon), MECITECH (MECHATRONICS, INNOVATION, TECHNOLOGY).

Since all my team members are less than 24 in age.