Blue Planet Hackathon

Global wildlife population has fallen by over 58 percent since the 1970s. If the trend continues, the population could decline two-thirds by 2020. 93 percent of the big cats have been lost in the last 50 years, 100 million sharks are killed every year, and 85 thousand elephants were killed in the last 5 years in Tanzania alone. And this is just a part of the $15 billion illegal wildlife trade market every year.

Help prevent poaching, illegal trading, or habitat destruction to elevate the numbers and protect species via solutions in the areas of education, awareness, tagging, mapping, tracking, and more.

Forests cover 31 percent of the world’s total land surface, just over 4 billion hectares (4 billion rugby fields). More than 80 percent of the world’s territorial diversity exists in the forests. Over 300 million people globally live in these forests, while over 1.6 billion depend on them for their daily needs and livelihood.
However, the forest area has reduced by 32 percent from 5.9 billion hectares in the pre-industrial times. The world’s largest rainforest - The Amazon, lost at least 17 percent of its forest cover in the last half century alone.

Save the forests and prevent deforestation while simultaneously working towards increasing the forest cover by promoting education, awareness, and creating solutions in fields such as artificial intelligence, data analysis, and mobile development.

Ninety-five percent of the world’s population breathes polluted air. In 2017, air pollution was the cause of 6 million deaths, making it the fourth largest cause of death in the world. Seventy-one percent of the earth’s surface is covered by water, out of which 96.5 percent is in the oceans. The North Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean combined have over 3 million pieces of plastic floating around. This extensive pollution causes the death of over 1 million seabirds and 100,000 sea mammals every year.

Work towards a safer environment by promoting and ensuring clean air and water are available to people. Create solutions to track and improve the quality of breathable air and water resources around the world.

The temperature has risen by over 1.5 degrees since the mid-1800s. If the environment keeps degrading at the current rate, the average temperature could increase by 4-12 degrees by the end of the 21st century. This would lead to catastrophes, making thousands of species extinct and raising the sea level to such an extent that entire cities would be submerged.

Help in tracking and reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) effects to decrease global warming and create a sustainable future by developing efficient solutions.