A non-profit programme, AdamStart, has today announced it will be launching a $5 million fund to support sustainable youth-led businesses which tackles society’s biggest problems.

The announcement comes on the 28th birthday of its founder and Queen’s Young Leader, Adam Bradford. The initiative which was started 10 years ago in London, UK, has already led several youth impact programmes in Africa, including during the COVID-19 pandemic. Its COVID-19 Innovation Challenge attracted over 1,500 applications and was featured globally on BBC World News and Sky Television.

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The new fund will be financed by private investors and will be chaired by a high profile board of innovators, businesspeople and public figures who have an interest in developing Africa and the world’s youth.

It will also go some way towards supporting AdamStart’s existing programmes which support youth voice and young people’s development across the globe. The programme recently named Ritika Singhal, 15, from India, as its Teen COVINATOR winner. Ritika, from India, runs an education programme to increase education of young people during the COVID pandemic. Her initiative has been supported following the highly successful cohort of COVID innovation prize winners which include Juliet Namujju and Patrick Sseremba from Uganda. The programme is well known for supporting start-up young entrepreneurs whose ideas make a difference.

Adam Bradford, its founder is one of the Queen’s Young Leaders and a former advisor to the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust. He is also a One Young World ambassador and a fellow of the Royal Commonwealth Society and Royal Society of Arts. Today, on the announcement of the programme’s next steps, he set out his greater vision: ‘We will partner with some of the most progressive changemakers across the world, majorly in Africa, to bring about sustainable solutions to problems exacerbated by the Coronavirus pandemic. We have always been here for change and that is what we will diligently pursue in our latest quest to empower young minds across the world.”