Ammon News -

The young people travelled to London and received their award from His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane in a ceremony televised across the UK.

This week, three young Jordanians have won a prestigious new sustainability prize as part of The Prince’s Trust Awards at a ceremony held in London’s Theatre Royal Drury Lane. The awards, which celebrate young people from across Prince’s Trust programmes, were broadcast to audiences across the UK for the first time on ITV.

Founded by His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales, The Prince’s Trust group of charities now works in over 20 countries. Part of The Prince’s Trust Group, Prince’s Trust International has been working with local partners in Jordan since 2019, working to give young people the skills to build careers and become entrepreneurs.

For most people, speed bumps are a common and unremarkable road safety feature. But for a team of teenage entrepreneurs in Jordan, they’re an inspiration.

Fifteen-year-old Zaid, Maya and Mohammad came up with an ingenious way to use speed bumps to generate electricity. The trio’s prize-winning business concept, EcoRoad, sees the bumps adapted to absorb and transform kinetic energy from passing cars, with the electricity then stored in batteries for sale.

“Our business idea is about tackling the energy problem and environmental issues,” explains EcoRoad team leader Zaid. “Jordan has lots and lots of road bumps, so we thought we may as well use them”.
Zaid, Maya and Mohammad team have now secured seed funding for their idea, and the prototype is under technical development with a local company.

The team developed the idea on Prince’s Trust International’s Enterprise Challenge programme, delivered in partnership with local organisation, INJAZ. The programme inspires young people in Jordan to develop practical business skills through coaching, mentoring, and a virtual business simulation game.

Having already beaten over 2300 participants to be crowned winners of their national Enterprise Challenge competition, the EcoRoad team are now double champions. To win The Prince’s Trust Group Sustainability Award, the team’s idea was assessed based on its environmental and community impact, approach to innovation and the use of resource and ease of replicability.

The award was presented by Edward Enninful OBE, Editor-in-Chief of British Vogue and Global Ambassador for The Trust. During the ceremony, Edward commented “As Global Ambassador of The Prince’s Trust, it is such an inspiration to witness the stories of young people being supported around the world. The Prince’s Trust Group Sustainability Award is a fantastic showcase of the work The Trust and young people are doing.

“The winners of this award are a group of school students from Jordan, who were challenged with coming up with a sustainable business idea. The team far exceeded expectations and their invention is a brilliant solution to help our world”.

Commenting on the win, EcoRoad team leader, Zaid, said:
“Winning this award means so much to us as a team. It will help us to inspire other young people to create change. I suggest that all young students invest their time in projects like these – it’s important for our futures and for everyone around us as we look to build more sustainable lives”.