Ghana’s innovative project wins Green Development Award at Huawei’s Global ICT Competition

A group of students from the University of Ghana has been honoured the Green Development Award at the recently concluded Huawei’s Global ICT Competition, after evolving an AI-powered finding to battle against Ghana’s non-stop deforestation hurdles. The victors involved Wisdom Nana-Abena Ogbonna, Ryan Nii Akwei Brown, and Jehoaddan Ebrah Andoh. Under the supervision of their lecturer Mr. Julius Ludu their project, “Climate Sentinel,”- an AI and Internet of Things (IoT) system – was intended to deliver real-time observation and notification systems for Ghana’s forest reserves.

Talking over their “Climate Sentinel” project, colleague Ryan Nii Akwei Brown mentioned that a report they reviewed which declared that nine out of Ghana’s forty-four forest reserves have been fully preoccupied by illegal miners induced them to address Ghana’s deforestation struggle as their based project. “Climate Sentinel” tackles Ghana’s deforestation through technological interchange. The system joins together AI algorithms with IoT sensors to generate an observation network that can find or discover deforestation activities instantaneous in every part of the country’s forest reserves.

The solution makes use of AI, cloud computing, IoT, big data, and other technologies as needed by the Huawei’s Global ICT competition’s AI Innovation track, which tasks  students to determine issues or difficulties and brings about solutions with social interest and economic value. The team’s achievement came through taking part in this year’s competition, which gained a greater scale in its 9th edition, fascinating more than 210,000 students and instructors from over 2,000 colleges and institutions in more than 100 countries and regions, which includes Ghana. To get to the worldwide finals, 179 teams from 48 countries had to qualify from their different national and regional competitions around three major tracks: Practice, Innovation, and Programming. 

The Ghanaian group took part in the Innovation track, of which they achieved the second place at the regional competition qualifying them for the World Finals in China, where they eventually won the Green Development Award. Talking about the award, Prof. Ebenezer Owusu, the Head of Computer Science Department at the University of Ghana, congratulated Huawei for setting up the ICT Competition. He said “the Huawei Global ICT Conpetition contest provided our students the chance to show a spirit of teamwork, and established their intelligence of the essentials of ICT”. He then highlighted the importance of the contest in shaping students for the progressing tech industry, mentioning that it not only supports in sharpening their technical skills but it is also crucial in evolving critical problem-solving abilities, teamwork, and innovation.

Prof. Owusu also showed how grateful he was to Huawei for their consistent support in shaping the generation to come in ICT professionals in Ghana and over. Giving a speech at the Closing and Awards Ceremony of the Global Finals, the Director, ICT Strategy and Business Development Dept at Huawei, Ritchie Peng, stated that: “To attain the aim of learning through contest and encouraging innovation through contest, we have constantly developed the design of contest subjects. The Practice Competition lines up with our innovation for an Intelligent World 2030 and inspires students to become an expert in cloud computing, big data, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to foster social advancement.

The new measures Competition aims on sustainable development and digital inclusion, encouraging participators  to find solutions to real-life or actual difficulties in sectors like healthcare, agriculture, and education through ICT.” Inaugurated in 2015, the Huawei’s Global ICT Competition functioned as a global stage for academic contest and technological transfer. The yearly event allows students and teachers to build up their ICT understanding, better practical skills, and promote innovation using modern technologies and stages. The contest has been identified as an essential partner flagship program by UNESCO’s Global Skills Academy and it will still remain to handle the still requirements of the digital age.

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