Business & Money | Wednesday 25 February, 2015 2:20 pm |

The Coca-Cola Foundation, in partnership with INJAZ Al-Arab, have declared the winners of the sixth edition of the ‘Ripples of Happiness’ program from a wide variety of projects submitted by hundreds of Arab youth across Middle East. This exciting semester has resulted in over a whopping 4000 hours of community service across 22 cities in the region. The finalists are being awarded a special grant from the Coca-Cola foundation in an aim to grow and scale their community projects. Securing the first place position and receiving a $10,000 grant, was team LOYAC from Lebanon that gathered students across different universities for the first time in the history of the Ripples of Happiness program. These students worked through their differences to create a revolutionary product, and the namesake of their project entitled: ZOAP.
Students from Effat University, Saudi Arabia, came in close second with their ‘Let’s Build their Future’ project, which secured them a $7,000 grant to implement their idea. The University of Bahrain secured third place and $5,000 for their Avenir project.
A common thread weaves through all the aforementioned commendable projects and that is resourcefulness. The students were given a mere sum of $500 dollars to work with to make them understand the importance of fiscal responsibility. They exemplified this trait seamlessly in their projects and were able to accomplish a lot with a small sum of money.
Chairman of INJAZ Al-Arab Regional Board, H.E Sheikh Khaled Bin Zayed Al Nehayan remarks, “We are thrilled to partner with the Coca-Cola foundation for yet another successful term of the Ripples of Happiness Program. This initiative creates a sense of self-motivation, confidence and empowerment and enhances the mind-set that ‘anything is possible’ among Arab youth.
 
Antoine Tayyar, Director of Public Affairs and Communications Coca-Cola Middle East Region comments, “Arab youth are the heartbeat of society; their passion and motivation to make a positive impact is predominant in the region. The Ripples of Happiness program in the Middle East offers students the opportunity to become equipped with the proper tools and acquire the skills needed to make positive changes in their communities. We are delighted to see that the youth are engaged and creating great projects aimed at benefitting their communities through small actions with big chain reactions. “
Interim CEO of INJAZ Al-Arab, Akef Aqrabawi comments, “ There was a need for a program that creates a public/private sector partnership in education that brings private sector volunteers into public school classrooms to provide students with business and entrepreneurial skills and that’s where INJAZ Al -Arab and The Coca-Cola foundation step in to fill that gap.”

The winning team from Lebanon used deep rooted insights to guide them to the creation of a new product called Zoap, which uses upcycled cooking oil to create soap. The objectives of their project sought to tackle unemployment, environmental sustainability and social issues related to hygiene. So, the students taught three unemployed, underprivileged women how to make the soap using the recycled oil and used social media to market their product and spread awareness on the importance of recycling and hygiene. With their awarded grant, the students will expand their project to empower more women across Lebanon and develop different kinds of products, from liquid soap to lotions.
The ‘Let’s Build their Future’ project from Saudi Arabia speaks to the core of a very topical issue in the kingdom. Namely, how to preserve social morals and instill traditions into children-the future general of community leaders. Their project has foundations resting upon rigorous research that suggests that children’s cartoon consumption dramatically affects their behavior and attitudes, especially children between the ages of three to five. So the project aims to produce cartoons that include educative messages that teach good manners to positively mold the child’s developmental personality. The students went on to research cues that children respond to in terms of visual aesthetics and diction to create a script and an animation called ‘Ghassan’s Adventures.’ With their awarded grant, the students intend to continue producing high quality guided cartoon movies by contracting with production companies.


The third place winners from the University of Bahrain created a recycling campaign called ‘Avenir’ which is French for ‘future’ because they had the future of Bahrain at the heart of their concept. This campaign was molded to be a highly sustainable project that incorporated education and entertainment to condition people to recycle. The product is a recycling bin that emits a fun sound once waste is disposed. The bins also collect points for the recycler so that they can be redeemed for awards. Using social media and public relations the students created quite a buzz that took the community by storm as more and more citizens rallied behind the common love for their country and it’s environmental sustainability.

The ‘Ripples of Happiness’ program is geared toward empowering the youth and equipping them with the ammunition they need to become socially responsible members of their respective societies. The program also instills a strong sense of entrepreneurship in the participants, and plants seeds of workplace readiness that continue to blossom even after the program has come to an end. The Coca-Cola Foundation joins forces with INJAZ-Al-Arab to train university students in the art of identifying opportunities in their local communities and how to implement projects that will leave a positive impact as a strategy to encourage other members of society to follow their lead, thus creating a ‘ripples effect’ that will continue to spread from one generation to another.

Upon its inception in 2012 the Ripples of Happiness program was rolled out in five countries, and across only two universities in each. Currently, the program has a remarkable presence in six countries and four universities in each. The program now takes place simultaneously across Palestine, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Jordan and most recently the United Arab Emirates, reaching over 1800 students and has resulted in over 21,320 hours of community service , with over 100 volunteers, benefiting thousands of people.