23 July 2020, Nur-Sultan – Today, a virtual hackathon has kicked off in Kazakhstan, bringing together some of the country’s brightest minds. Programmers, innovators and tech entrepreneurs have met for a three-day hackathon to put together their skills and creativity to bring an SDG-based game from physical to online environment.

“Digital technologies and their implementation offer the potential to accelerate change and increase social and economic development. We believe that digital solutions will spearhead for building a safer and more prosperous future for us all. This is what the globally agreed Agenda-2030 and the Sustainable Development Goals call for,’ stated Yakup Beris, UNDP Resident Representative in Kazakhstan.

The ‘Mission 2030’ hackathon is a platform to digitalize a well-known SDGs-based board game that was introduced in 2019 in order to engage citizens and other stakeholders in identifying solutions to development problems. UNDP, together with the national partners, presented the game across all regions of the country, encouraging citizens to play and generate SDGs-based solutions to the problems they were facing. The game received strong positive feedback, indicating demand for wider dissemination.

It is expected that rethinking and redesigning the game through digitalization will increase the SDGs awareness as well as make it more accessible across the country. The three days will include sessions to help participants brainstorm, define, and develop a product, ending with a final pitching to the judges. The participants will be accompanied by mentors throughout the process. The winning team will receive $5,000 USD cash price to continue to fully develop the final product.

Hackathons emerged as quick collaborative spaces for engineering and designing software solutions to address development issues from governance matters to environment and urban development.  Participants collaborate, establish bonds, and share their skills, while fostering the local tech community and know-how.

The event is organized by UNDP Kazakhstan in cooperation with a global company, Seedstars.

Please visit the event’s website https://mission2030.kz/ for more information and follow the event on UNDP Kazakhstan (@UNDP.kazakhstan) and Seedstars (@seedspace_nursultan) social media accounts.