Three teenagers from Nigeria created an app that they believe will aid in the fight against climate change.
The group developed “EarthExp,” which combines environmental trend information with social networking and games.
Users build cities, but they must take into account potential environmental impacts as they grow.
One of the developers, Fortune Somuadia, explained the idea behind the app.
In order to develop a sense of action towards climate change, she explained, “we decided to get people not so fully stuck on our app, but stuck on our app enough to be able to develop that thought that they can do something to relieve climate change.”
Therefore, the main goal is to use persuasion to change our users’ behavior in exchange for favorable feedback regarding climate action.
Fortune enlisted the aid of Favor Chibuike to make the app.
In the game, there is a feature that requires you to plant three additional trees for every tree you cut down, she adds.
So you notice that it affects how you act around your surroundings in the game if you don’t care for your environment and all that other stuff.
African officials are pushing for more industrialized nations to be held accountable for environmental harm caused to developing nations.
According to estimates from the U.N. and Africa Development Bank, Africa needs about $3 trillion to meet the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) that each nation is required to submit as part of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.
According to Fortune, despite not being the largest producer of greenhouse gases, Africa is still negatively impacted.
“We are actually very skeptical of it because, despite the fact that Africa as a whole emits fewer greenhouse gases than the United States and other nations, we are still significantly impacted. We are most impacted when severe floods and heatwaves occur in Africa.”
EarthExp won a regional prize in a global competition held in 2022 by Technovation, a nonprofit organization based in the US that encourages women and girls to use technology to create positive change.
It occurs before the COP27 United Nations Climate Change Conference, which is set to take place in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, in November of 2022.
The mobile application is an addition to their neighborhood and school campaigns encouraging people to reduce their use of plastic and properly dispose of their waste.
