Launched by the WHO Global Coordination Mechanism on NCDs (GCM/NCD), the NCD Lab is a dedicated platform crowdsourcing grassroots innovation for NCD prevention and control. Bottom-up, grassroots health initiatives that mobilize community knowledge and account for local contexts often prove more effective and sustainable in addressing NCDs than externally managed, ‘top-down’ interventions. If locally sourced innovations can be corroborated by evidence and scaled in different settings, they could have major national or even global impact.
In 2022, in collaboration with the WHO Innovation Hub and in support of the WHO Acceleration Plan to STOP Obesity, the NCD Lab called for innovative submissions addressing the complex determinants and drivers of obesity. More than 30 submissions were received and reviewed, and four excellent projects have been selected. They showcase novel, multidisciplinary and high-impact approaches to tackle obesity in Kenya, Chile and India.
In this hybrid webinar held on on Friday, 2 December 14:00-16:00 CET live from WHO's Eurêka Innovation Centre, particpants heard directly from the project leads of these promising innovations. The webinar also included a panel discussion featuring WHO innovation experts and NCD leads who discussed how WHO is supporting countries to implement and scale innovations for impact.
