By SHARON UDASIN
08/25/2011 02:39

First-time social entrepreneurship competition will distribute NIS 100,000 worth of prize money at contest’s end.
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The Environmental Protection Ministry, in conjunction with Ashoka Israel and the Green Environment Fund, has for the first time launched a social entrepreneurship competition that will distribute NIS 100,000 worth of prize money for young entrepreneurial projects at the contest’s end, the ministry announced on Tuesday.

Called “Do More with Less,” the competition aims to attract all types of candidates – individuals, non-profit organizations, businesses or government agencies – who have ideas for projects that can contribute to encouraging the proper use of environmental resources, the ministry said in a statement.

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Contestants will be able to submit project ideas through October 23, and the winners will be announced by Environmental Protection Minister Gilad Erdan at the WATEC International Environmental Exhibition in November, with the first place recipient receiving NIS 50,000, second place NIS 30,000 and NIS 5,000 for the next four runners-up.

The Ashoka global organization has participated in 24 such cooperative social entrepreneurship competitions, working with groups such as Google, Nike, Citibank, National Geographic and the G-20, the ministry said.

“To paraphrase the famous saying, ‘Give a man a fish, you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish and you have fed him for a lifetime,’ social entrepreneurship is trying to change the fishing industry from the ground up,” Ashoka CEO Nir Tsuk said in the same statement.

“The new competition – the first in Israel – will flood new solutions to existing problems and will help to transform Israel into a start-up nation not only in hi-tech, but also in social and environmental fields.”

http://www.jpost.com/Sci-Tech/Article.aspx?id=235298