PMI AIRS Mali Wins Innovation Challenge Grand Prize
From Left: Project Director Brad Lucas, PMI IRS Lead Allison Belemvire, AIRS Mali Entomological Coordinator Moussa Cisse, AIRS Mali Chief of Party Elie Bankineza and AIRS Mali Operations Manager Seydou Traoré. The PMI Africa Indoor Residual Spraying (AIRS) Project’s Mali program has been awarded the Grand Prize of PMI’s Innovation Challenge. PMI AIRS protects millions of people in Africa from malaria by spraying insecticide on the walls, ceilings, and other indoor resting places of mosquitoes that transmit malaria, a process known as indoor residual spraying. Abt Global leads PMI AIRS.
AIRS Mali won the challenge for its new insecticide inventory system. AIRS Mali designed an Access-based database system, known as the e-inventory, to provide a daily balance of all insecticides located in all secondary stores and two central warehouses. Seven countries entered 15 innovations into the contest.
In Mali, the Project relies on small secondary stores during the indoor residual spray campaign. These stores are not large enough to house the amount of insecticide needed to cover the entire spray campaign in a given geographical area. In addition, the risk of accidents with insecticide is high when transporting large quantities long distances or on roads difficult to navigate due to heavy rains.
The prize came with an additional $50,000 in funds to enhance the country program’s work. The PMI contest invited PMI AIRS country programs to submit new technologies, implementation strategies, and partnerships that addressed challenges and/or presented improvements to implementing the PMI AIRS Project.
Read more about the award and PMI AIRS.
