Launched in August 2011, the SparkTheRise website offered a call to action, for people to share their ideas, seek help, and win grants and vote for their favourite projects
Spark the Rise sought suggestions in five categories, namely technology, infrastructure and transportation, energy, agriculture and rural development, and social entrepreneurship
Project ideas were submitted, voted upon, and the most popular and viable came to fruition
Results:
6,000 ideas where submitted in season one
Achieved reach of over 87 million people
Over 2 million people actively engaged with the initiative on the website, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube
32,000 people supported projects by volunteering, offering expert advice, donating equipment or offering to be funders
1,471 projects had been approved, there were 311,817 users and 354,817 votes were cast on the website and via SMS