Five years ago, Response Innovation Lab launched its first platform in Jordan, kicking off an adventure that continues to prove exciting and essential to this day. To mark this milestone and the start of a new phase in our initiative, we wanted to share with you some of the most noteworthy accomplishments of our amazing colleagues and partners. Together, we have grown RIL into the largest network of field-based humanitarian innovation platforms in the world and have collectively demonstrated that decentralizing innovation processes, strengthening response-level ecosystems, promoting locally-developed solutions and encouraging horizontal scaling can improve humanitarian and “nexus” programming while also delivering on the promises of the Grand Bargain.

In 2020-2021, RIL further supported investment in this field by facilitating the 3rd call of the Dutch Relief Alliance Innovation Fund – allowing an investment of EUR 2 million in locally-led innovative proposals. See more about this locally-driven approach to funding innovation and the great solutions that emerged here.

A tailored curriculum has been developed based on an analysis of capacity gaps and existing other training programmes in Uganda. It has been delivered in partnership with Save the Children, United Social Ventures and the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation. - Learn more about innovator trainings here

RIL Uganda runs a Learning Hub for the refugee response actors and has supported them to learn and uptake best practices around: the Refugee Engagement Forum- Learn more about U-Learn here

With the LINS project, RIL Uganda identified alternative solutions to the traditional distribution of free and imported nutritious foods (corn-soya blend/porridge) through a participative and competitive process.
Learn more about LINS here

The Iraq Response Innovation Lab (IRIL) has completed a study to explore the potential of renewable energy sources in Iraq in the light of their experience with using solar energy for the incubated agribusiness projects in 2021 and the challenges that accompanied that they encountered.
Learn more about the Two Studies here:

Renewable *Energy Reflective Study

*Recycling Reflective Study

The latest startup that has reached the last stages of the Incubation Process is Al Bustan Mobile Application. Al Bustan Application is a mobile application that links farmers, service providers and consultants in a streamlined way. It is being developed to help farmers to move towards improving their production and increasing productivity by facilitating market linkages. The application is under development specifically for the Mosul market, and expected to launch as a pilot within the month of July 2022.

Work for all is an initiative that was launched by the Iraq Response Innovation Lab to support employment in Iraq. As Iraq struggles to recover from the war with ISIS, economic hardship and the impact of COVID-19, people from diverse backgrounds and educational levels have had difficulty accessing employment. [Unemployment rates in Iraq].
Learn more about Work for All here

Social enterprises are sustainable businesses with primarily social or environmental objectives. While the social enterprise adapts the ways that businesses function, their primary objective is to maximize social benefit. Social enterprises use business tactics and modalities to fix, or minimize the negative effect of, a certain issue in society. In Iraq, this concept is new, however, SIDA, alongside Oxfam’s partners and the Iraq Response Innovation Lab, launched an incubator open to local NGOs (Nongovernmental Organizations) willing to create sustainable social enterprises.Learn more about Go Green here

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Watch a video from the incubator here

In 2021, LINS issued a call for nutrition innovations/solutions that are locally rooted, market-driven, sustainable, with satisfactory proof of concept, and less dependent on humanitarian aid flows. The call sought to support quality solutions to at least one of the major challenges of malnutrition

Participation in the MIT D-Lab’s Co-Creation Summit in Arua, Uganda, which promoted locally designed solutions to energy and livelihoods challenges in refugee settlements.

Response Innovation Lab (RIL) and 48percent.org are announcing a strategic partnership to scale further and support innovations around access to connectivity in humanitarian and emergency contexts.

In December 2020, RIL held a week-long virtual global retreat to share reflections from the past year on each of the humanitarian responses and challenges, success, and plans for the upcoming year. Each session is about 30 minutes long.

UNDP Accelerator Labs, Honey Bee Network, and GIAN have jointly organized the first International annual competition for creative & innovative ideas or traditional knowledge practices around the world, which solve day-to-day problems. Life Shelter received this International Award among 2,500 solutions around the world.

The Uganda RIL published an Op-Ed in Devex regarding lessons learned integrating innovation into the Uganda refugee response. Localizing innovation takes a central theme in the article. Please take a read!

Innovative techniques and platforms are proving to be a key factor in humanitarian responses to ongoing regional conflicts, severe weather patterns, a changing climate, and forced migration. Read how RIL’s work aligns with the 2030 SDGs goals.

A founding principle to RIL has always been the focus on strengthening local ecosystems to build resiliency and contextualized support for the response.