Wavemakers Project Topic

As the world faces increasing uncertainty and disruptions, how might we imagine and design a future where communities, countries, organizations and businesses are resilient, inclusive, sustainable, and innovative by design? As a team, you will select one of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) prompts to help shape your answer to this critical question.

Pick one of the challenges that you are passionate about, and use that as a starting point to solve a real-world problem. Get creative; solutions can range from local to global, non-profit to industrial, and analog to digital.

Disruptions are affecting every community around the globe. How you think about those disruptions and what you do with them will shape the future.

Each of the prompts is linked to one of the United Nations sustainable development goals (SDG).

Good Health and Wellbeing

Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages.

Background: Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3 aims to ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages. It addresses all major health priorities, including:

  • reproductive, maternal and child health

  • infectious, chronic and, non-communicable diseases

  • strengthening the prevention, harm reduction and treatment of substance use

  • Universal health coverage

  • mental health, including addictions

  • the health of Indigenous communities

  • access for all to safe, effective, quality and affordable medicines and vaccines

It also calls for more research and development, increased health financing, and strengthened capacity of all countries in health risk reduction and management. Canadians do not experience good health and well-being equally. Many of these inequalities are the result of individuals' and groups' relative social, political, and economic disadvantages. Working to reduce health inequalities means helping to give everyone the same opportunities to be healthy, no matter who they are or where they live.

Quality Education

Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all

Background: Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4 aims to ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning. Education:

  • enables upward socioeconomic mobility

  • is a key to escaping poverty

  • helps reduce inequalities and reach gender equality

  • is crucial to fostering tolerance and more peaceful societies

  • has a direct impact on the realization of all human rights

  • is a primary driver of progress across all 17 SDGs

Ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all is essential for Canada’s economic and social prosperity, and for the well-being of all Canadians.

Clean Water and Sanitation

Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all

Background: Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 aims to ensure access to safe water sources and sanitation for all. SDG 6 goes beyond drinking water, sanitation and hygiene. It also addresses the quality and sustainability of water resources, critical to the survival of people and the planet.

The 2030 Agenda recognizes the centrality of water resources to sustainable development. Improved drinking water, sanitation and hygiene are vital to driving progress in other areas, including health, education and poverty reduction.

Canada’s ambition for this goal is to ensure Canadians have access to drinking water and use it in a sustainable manner. The national target is for all of the long-term drinking water advisories on public systems on First Nation reserves to be resolved.

Canada supports international cooperation on sound water management through various multilateral organizations, such as the G20, the Global Environment Facility and the United Nations, to align efforts and resources towards achieving all water and sanitation-related SDGs.

Responsible Consumption and Production

Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns

Background: Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 12 aims to implement policies that support the shift to sustainable practices and decouple economic growth from resource use.

The world is seriously off track in its effort to halve per-capita food waste and losses by 2030.The COVID-19 pandemic has had significant impacts on consumption and production patterns, with disruptions to global supply chains and changes in consumer behaviour. Responsible consumption and production must be an integral part of the recovery from the pandemic. But the global economy also needs to speed up the decoupling of economic growth from resource use by maximizing the socio-economic benefits of resources while minimizing their negative impacts. Reporting on corporate sustainability has tripled since the beginning of the SDG period, but the private sector will need to significantly improve reporting on activities that contribute to the SDGs.

Industries, Innovation and Infrastructure

Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation

Background: Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 9 aims to spur inclusive and sustainable industrialization, innovation and infrastructure that combine to generate jobs and income. It sets goals that emphasize the potential benefits of:

  • new technologies

  • more robust international trade

  • more efficient and sustainable use of resources

Those include resilient infrastructure, inclusive and sustainable industrialization, especially in least developed countries, and improved access to financial services for small-scale enterprises. It calls for enhanced scientific research and technological capabilities with far more research and development workers, complemented by greater access to information and communications technology.

Criteria for project pitch submission

Student projects and presentations will be evaluated using the following criteria. Digital credentials will be awarded based on the team’s final presentation, as well as individual participation and collaboration within the team:

  1. Alignment - the project addresses the challenge/opportunity presented

  2. Potential for Impact - the project considers systems thinking and will help create communities/businesses that are resilient, inclusive and innovative

  3. Risk Identification - potential risks/barriers and solutions to these challenges have been identified 

  4. Meaningful Metrics - the project considers relevant and credible KPIs to ensure success

  5. Innovative Approach - the project is different/unique compared to other existing solutions

  6. Scalability - the team has considered and identified how the project can be scaled to positively impact a large number of people

  7. Presentation Flow - clarity of the project through a structured presentation that is engaging, well-thought out, communicated clearly, and visually appealing

  8. Articulation of Application of Future-Proof Capabilities - the team clearly identifies when and how the ten future-proof capabilities that they worked on during the Wavemakers program have been applied in the creation and execution of their project and presentation