Grants

This project tackles the issues faced by low-income and minority communities disproportionately affected by waste burning, where traditional air monitoring falls short. It aims to establish local air quality monitoring, replace polluting waste facilities with cleaner alternatives, and boost environmental advocacy through wearable sensors.

The Afri-SET centre promotes widespread and responsible uptake of low-cost air quality sensors in West Africa. This will help increase air quality monitoring capacity and directly supporting effective health and environmental policy-making in the region.

This project will deploy a network of air quality sensors in Kintampo. It will analyse the air quality data by drawing on data from a birth cohort study to estimate the effects of ambient air pollution on early life indicators of non communicable disease risk.

This grant will build demand for clean air and catalyse and connect a group of youth-led advocates for clean air in Cape Town, Accra, Lagos and during COP27. It will raise awareness of the problem of air pollution as a health and climate risk in African cities, the inadequate measurement in the target cities, and the potential for clean air access to support physical activity. It will also provide a proof of concept and learnings towards the widespread use of wearable monitoring to achieve campaigning and advocacy goals.