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business funding, Events, Opportunities

2ND ECOWAS STARTUP AWARDS

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Application Deadline: 31 August 2026

LOCATION: Nigeria

A regional initiative of the ECOWAS Commission to identify, celebrate, and scale high-impact startups—advancing innovation, digital entrepreneurship, and economic integration across West Africa.

The 2nd ECOWAS Startup Awards are convened by the Directorate of Private Sector and Industry of the ECOWAS Commission, hosted in Abuja, and jointly implemented by the Pan African Alliance of Small and Medium Industries (PAOSMI) and Investment Promotion Agencies of West African States (IPAWAS).

ELIGIBILITY:

Applicants must meet all six requirements below.

Be a citizen of an ECOWAS Member State

Operate a startup registered and based within an ECOWAS country

Have a minimum of two (2) years of operations

Demonstrate a working product or service

Show evidence of market traction or scalability

Submit all required documentation

What you will need: Prepare these before you start—the form saves as you go.

Completed application form: Sections A–J, completed in this portal

National passport or ECOWAS-approved identity document: Lead founder — PDF or image, max 10 MB

Passport photograph: Recent colour photograph, max 5 MB

Business registration certificate issued in an ECOWAS Member State, if applicable

Two years of financial statements: Statements, management accounts or projections

Business plan: Maximum 10 pages, single spacing, Times New Roman 12

Pitch deck: maximum 10 slides

One-minute pitch video (MP4, MOV, or WebM, max 100 MB)

This second edition is expected to bring together 60 startups from across the member states and is designed in line with international best practices to ensure transparency, fairness, inclusivity, and merit-based selection.

BENEFIT:

Cash prize: $30,000 for the winner, $20,000 for the first runner-up, and $15,000 for the second.

Regional visibility: Profile across all twelve Member States.

Access to investors: Introductions through the deal rooms.

Networking: Founders, policymakers, and development partners.

Mentorship support: A 6-month acceleration programme with capacity building.

Digital tools: Computers, accessories, and software.

APPLY
Jobs, Opportunities, student internship

ECOWAS BANK FOR INVESTMENT AND DEVELOPMENT (EBID) CALL FOR APPLICATIONS FOR THE RECRUITMENT OF YOUNG GRADUATES(INTERNSHIP)

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Application Deadline: May 31, 2024

LOCATION: Multiple Regions

The ECOWAS Bank for Investment and Development (EBID), the financial arm of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), is an international financial institution belonging to the 15 ECOWAS Member States which are Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo. Its headquarters is in Lomé in the Togolese Republic. As part of the implementation of its young graduates program, the EBID wishes to recruit young graduates from universities and major schools in the West African sub-region and the diaspora.

ELIGIBILITY:

Can apply for this program, candidates who are nationals of ECOWAS member countries meeting the following conditions:

be aged 30 or less at the time of recruitment;

hold a higher education diploma such as bac +5 (MASTER, DESS) or an equivalent diploma in line with the Bank’s operations, in particular private sector operations, public sector operations, infrastructure, risk management, asset/liability management, finance, auditing, legal advice, communications and marketing, language services, or any other field of study relevant to the Bank’s operations;

be able to work in a team and under pressure in a multicultural context;

have a good capacity for analysis and synthesis, sense of organization, planning and setting priorities;

have a good command of relevant information research techniques (banking analyses, statistics, monitoring of competitive trends, etc.), from external sources, mainly electronic and other professionally recognized media;

have a good command of office tools (Excel, Word, Access and Power Point);

have an excellent ability to communicate in French and/or English and/or Portuguese, and a good knowledge of one of the two other languages).

BENEFIT:

In accordance with the provisions governing the program, young graduates are assigned to departments to meet specific needs and are not recruited to fill vacant positions. They are, however, considered as civil servants of the bank for the duration of their appointment and benefit from the conditions of service corresponding to grade P1-1 of the Bank’s classification and remuneration scale.

Various allowances will be added to the salary corresponding to this grade (position adjustment, housing and transport allowances, family allowances if applicable). In addition, young graduates will be affiliated to the Bank’s retirement fund and will benefit during the period of their appointment from group insurance coverage covering the following risks: death and permanent, total and definitive disability, temporary incapacity for work. , partial permanent disability, illness, individual accidents.

APPLY