Facebook adds to Loeries official awards from 2017

With the Loeries over, Facebook has announced that it will make The Facebook Challenge an official Loerie Award in the Student Category from 2017.

To achieve this, it will work with the Loeries and advertising schools across South Africa to develop and promote young creative talent on an ongoing basis.

In addition to sponsoring The Loerie Student Awards for 2016, Facebook hosted a range of events aimed at young creatives in support of Loeries Creative Week which held between August 15 and 21 in Durban.

Facebook also partnered with the Nelson Mandela Foundation to run the first student ‘Hack for Good’ at this year’s Loerie Awards.

Twenty of the country’s top students competed in a 48-hour hack to create a world-class video campaign, speaking to the theme of “Tolerance” and “Living the Mandela Legacy”.
Facebook will sponsor the production and flight of the campaign on the second anniversary of Madiba’s passing on December 5.

“If we want to be more creative, we have to connect – with each other, the industry and the world,” said Nunu Ntshingila, head of Facebook Africa. “For Facebook, the Loeries is a perfect opportunity to celebrate how Africa’s dynamic creatives are using mobile to make human connections and tell compelling stories. Mobile is the creative canvas of our time and young African professionals will define how it is used in the years to come.

“We want to go beyond sponsorship to helping develop young, diverse talent through programmes and activities such as ‘Made on Mobile’ and ‘Hack for Good’. We believe that any teen with a phone can become a marketing expert or an entrepreneur. Facebook sees a future of mobi-entrepreneurs in Africa and we will help them unlock their creativity with the power of technology,” said Ntshingila.