Poverty Stoplight Wins ‘Best Digital Impact Solution’ Award from World Summit Awards 2024

Poverty Stoplight Wins ‘Best Digital Impact Solution’ Award from World Summit Awards 2024

The poverty elimination measurement tool and coaching methodology was featured in the ‘Inclusion & Empowerment’ category by the WSA Grand Jury and will be highlighted at the Global Congress in Hyderabad, India in April. 

The Poverty Stoplight, used by 60 countries to measure multidimensional poverty and eliminate it by co-creating solutions with the people experiencing it, has been selected as one of five winners of the “Inclusion and Empowerment” World Summit Award (WSA) 2024. The award recognizes the Best Digital Impact Solution. 

“We are incredibly delighted to have our tech solution to poverty measurement and elimination be recognized by the WSA alongside other impactful organizations,” said Luis Fernando Sanabria, Chief Operating Officer of Fundación Paraguaya. “Our mission to eliminate, not alleviate, poverty is one that takes a network of collaborators. By receiving this award we hope to be recognized by additional potential partner organizations throughout the world who want to utilize this impactful tech solution to better understand the communities they serve and work to better their circumstances alongside them.”

The WSA, a highly diverse and democratic award system, selects and promotes the world’s best digital innovation with impact on society. WSA was initiated in 2003 in the framework of the UN World Summit on the Information Society (UN WSIS). It contributes to the UN Sustainable Development Goals Agenda by recognizing local digital content with an impact on society, demonstrating the richness and diversity of innovative applications. The WSA Global Congress will convene with the winners in April in Hyderabad, India during the Digital, Democracy & Us: Impact Solutions for Global Challenges event where winners will present their digital tools which are transforming how people engage with governance, offering new ways to amplify voices, access information, and participate in decision-making, as well as digital innovations which address the world’s toughest challenges from climate action to social equity, to health, education and inclusion.

The Poverty Stoplight, created by Fundación Paraguaya, activates the potential of families, businesses, and communities to eliminate poverty. Using mobile technology and social innovation, the organization aids households in 60 countries and 24 languages in measuring and better understanding their poverty and co-designing solutions and a strategy to eliminate it.

Chosen from over 400 solutions worldwide, this global recognition highlights The Poverty Stoplight’s commitment to technical innovation, local impact, and advancing the UN SDGs. Social impact organizations that have won the 2024 alongside the Stoplight include Kyiv Digital, a versatile app designed to keep residents of Kyiv, Ukraine safe, informed, and connected, especially during crises like war or natural disasters; Achieve, a mobile app in Ghana designed to solve the problem of low adoption of personal finance products by providing easy access to investment options; and GoBarakah, a Malaysian platform that revolutionizes social assistance by offering secure, traceable, and transparent e-vouchers for donations. Review the full list of winners here. 

About Fundación Paraguaya

Founded in 1985, Fundación Paraguaya is one of the longest running and largest non-profits in Latin America, with programs reaching hundreds of thousands of families in over 60 countries throughout the world. Initially founded as a microfinance lending  institution, it has incorporated other services such as financial and entrepreneurial education programs for young people and a network of self-sufficient agricultural schools in rural areas. Fundación Paraguaya developed the Poverty Stoplight, a new poverty metric and coaching methodology that uses technology, self-assessment, and a bottom-up approach to help families escape poverty and has been implemented in over 60 countries. Learn more at www.fundacionparaguaya.org.py and  www.povertystoplight.org.  

About WSA

The World Summit Awards (WSA) are a highly diverse and democratic award system that selects and promotes the world’s best digital innovation with impact on society. Combining an ongoing series of international events and activities with a global network of start-ups, social entrepreneurs, mentors, jurors, speakers, experts, government leaders, academia and civil society, WSA is an international platform for innovative examples of how Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) can impact society in a positive way. With 20 years of international experience, WSA is a quality seal for digital content with societal impact in over 182 participating countries.

WSA was initiated in 2003 in the framework of the UN World Summit on the Information Society (UN WSIS) held in Geneva. The declared aim of the conference was to make ICT accessible to everyone and to bridge the digital divide. WSA was established as a means to achieve this and have been working to put UN-WSIS goals and UN SDGs into action ever since.