REact, the digital platform for introducing clean energy in humanitarian aid projects, developed by acciona.org in alliance with Action Against Hunger, receives the Social Innovation Award from the Spanish Association of Foundations (AEF, for its acronym in Spanish). This was the ninth edition of the AEF awards. Three awards were given to recognize Spanish philanthropists and foundations that best represent the values of the sector in three categories: philanthropic initiative, collaboration and social innovation.

Cristina Ruiz Martínez, manager of acciona.org, and Amador Gómez Arribas, director of Research and Innovation at Action Against Hunger, received the award. The awards ceremony took place at the María Cristina Masaveu Peterson Foundation (Madrid).

“In addition to rewarding the work of each foundation as an entity, we also want to celebrate the work of the people who work in them every day,” said the president of the AEF, Pilar García Ceballos-Zúñiga.

The Social Innovation Award aims to recognize a foundation that has managed to provide an effective response to a previously unattended social problem or demand, or to introduce a disruptive innovation in response to a problem or demand that has already been attended to. REact is the result of the project Greening humanitarian response in emergency contexts project: a free-access website and mobile platform to estimate energy needs in humanitarian contexts and guide organizations’ decision-making to meet those needs through solar energy.

According to Cristina Ruiz Martínez, manager of acciona.org, “acciona.org and Action Against Hunger have joined our experiences in universal energy access and humanitarian emergencies to create REact, a digital platform for introducing clean energy into humanitarian aid projects. REact is an example of how social innovation can transform humanitarian aid, creating solutions that not only solve immediate problems, but also generate long-term positive change”.

“Partnerships are essential to address global challenges, such as access to renewable energy in emergencies. REact, the award-winning initiative in the social innovation category, is the result of the partnership between Action Against Hunger and acciona.org but also of the participation of more than 40 humanitarian organizations working internationally,” said Amador Gómez, director of Research and Innovation at Action Against Hunge.