By Abbas Nazil
The African Development Bank Group’s ENNOVA youth entrepreneurship campaign has received a Salute to Excellence Award from the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ).
The media award recognises the Bank’s successful communication and outreach efforts aimed at connecting African young entrepreneurs with digital tools, skills and economic opportunities.
The award was presented in the “PR and Marketing Campaigns: Cause-Related Business” category at the NABJ Salute to Excellence Awards gala held in Atlanta, Georgia in August.
The recognition followed a campaign jointly implemented by the Bank Group and five development organisations that helped increase the number of ENNOVA platform users by nearly 59 per cent in less than 10 months.
The ceremony formed part of the NABJ’s annual convention, which attracted more than 4,300 registrants and brought together journalists and media professionals from across the United States and the wider African and African American diaspora.
ENNOVA is a digital platform developed to support young African entrepreneurs with tools for building skills, developing enterprises and connecting with opportunities capable of strengthening their businesses and creating employment.
Receiving the award on behalf of the Bank, Dr. Martin Fregene, Officer in Charge of the African Development Bank Group’s Vice Presidency for Agriculture, Human and Social Development, said creating jobs and expanding economic opportunities for Africa’s young population remained a key part of the Bank’s mandate.
He said ENNOVA provides a practical avenue for supporting that objective by helping young entrepreneurs turn ideas into viable businesses while improving their access to skills and opportunities.
Fregene also welcomed the NABJ recognition, saying effective communication was important to ensuring that development initiatives reached the people they were designed to support.
He said communicating development programmes effectively could help potential beneficiaries understand available opportunities and make practical use of them.
The ENNOVA campaign was launched at the Sankalp Africa Summit in February 2025 under the administration of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Lab in the African Development Bank’s Human Capital, Youth and Skills Development Department.
The campaign recorded an early boost in participation, with more than one-third of the estimated 1,500 attendees at the Sankalp Summit registering for the ENNOVA platform following its launch.
The Bank’s promotional strategy included explanatory videos, media engagement, social media campaigns, exhibition booth activities, a launch event video and direct promotion of the ENNOVA platform.
The campaign’s results were reflected in the substantial growth in platform users within its first 10 months, demonstrating the potential of targeted communication to expand awareness and uptake of youth-focused development initiatives.
Martha Phiri, the Bank’s Director for Human Capital, Youth and Skills Development, said the success of ENNOVA showed what could be achieved when development partners combined resources and expertise around a shared goal.
She said the collaboration had strengthened the platform’s ability to help young entrepreneurs acquire skills, develop their businesses and access opportunities.
Phiri added that partnerships of this nature were essential to transforming Africa’s expanding youth population from a demographic challenge into an economic advantage.
The development of ENNOVA was supported by several partners, including the Fund for African Private Sector Assistance, the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States, Korea-Africa Economic Cooperation, the European Commission and the Government of Switzerland.
The NABJ award adds to the African Development Bank Group’s record of recognition for development communications, bringing to five the number of Salute to Excellence Awards it has received for communications concerning agriculture and human and social development issues in less than a decade.
The Bank said the recognition underscored the importance of communicating development initiatives in ways that enable intended beneficiaries to understand and access available opportunities.
With Africa’s young population continuing to grow, ENNOVA represents part of the Bank’s broader effort to strengthen youth entrepreneurship, improve access to economic opportunities and support the creation of sustainable businesses and jobs across the continent.
