FEBRUARY 6 ― A solution to worsening traffic congestion may just be a few short years away. In December, Microsoft co-founder and billionaire Paul Allen teamed with the United States Department of Transportation (USDOT) to offer a US$50 million (RM207 million) prize to the winners of a Smart City competition aimed at implementing high-tech solutions to traffic jams by 2018. Unfortunately for commuters here, the contest is targeted at solving congestion on US roads and not in Singapore.

The USDOT prize is only one of many around the world designed to solve urban or social problems. The Florida-based Knight Foundation, for example, has funded nearly a dozen prizes worth a total of US$75 million since 2007 to improve communities, spur media innovation and support the arts. In 2014, the Centre for Challenge Prizes, part of the United Kingdom charity Nesta, launched the £10 million (S$20.7 million) Longitude Prize to find a solution to antibiotic resistance. Last year, XPrize — a non-profit organisation that organises competitions to encourage technological development to benefit mankind — launched a US$7 million global competition to transform the lives of low-literate adults around the world.

Indeed, a report by McKinsey & Company found that these and more than 60 other new prizes have debuted since 2000, with almost US$250 million in new prize money. Although philanthropists and governments have long used prizes to drive innovation for societal benefit, McKinsey said prizes are growing larger and are being applied to a wider range of societal objectives than ever before. Such competitions have turned out winning solutions with significant positive impact.

In the United Kingdom, winners of the £1 million Big Green Challenge were able to reduce C02 emissions by as much as 32 per cent through solutions such as a micro-hydropower scheme and a local household energy service. And solutions from the winners of the annual US$1 million Hult Prize, awarded by the non-profit Hult Prize Foundation, led to the creation of a new micro-farming industry in 2013 and to greatly expanded distribution of solar lamps in Africa in 2014.

Part of the reason the solutions work so well, the World Bank found, is that prizes can eliminate hidden biases of traditional grant programmes and engage an unlimited number of problem-solvers around the globe. Engaging this broader pool of talented people also allows the organiser to uncover a broader landscape of potential solutions, understand emerging trends better and create interested communities.

A different landscape in Singapore

With such big-money competitions producing results in Europe and the Americas, it is perhaps high time for Singapore to consider adopting a similar approach to finding solutions to nagging issues here.

Traffic congestion is a common complaint, for example, and MRT breakdowns have persisted despite years of work to fix them. Dengue fever strikes thousands of people every year, the threat of more haze from Indonesia continues, productivity increases remain low and growing income inequality is a concern as well.

To be sure, there are such competitions here, but the prizes are hardly inspiring. Samsung’s Solve for Tomorrow competition awards up to S$180,000 to student teams that leverage technology to address social issues, for instance, while the DBS-NUS Social Venture Challenge offers up to S$30,000 for a solution to challenging social problems.

The Vertical Cities Asia International Design Competition gives prizes totalling S$40,000 for building sustainable communities and liveable environments. Clearly, these are nowhere near the scale of those in other regions.

Rather than only continuing to give tiny prizes for incremental change or relying on the Government to solve problems, perhaps it is time for wealthy Singapore residents or big corporations to offer huge prizes to solve society’s biggest problems, either on their own or jointly with the public sector.

There is clearly no shortage of wealthy individuals or large companies in Singapore who could fund multi-million-dollar prizes.

And while there are plenty of government programmes and highly-qualified individuals that seek to address long-standing issues in Singapore, having a multi-million dollar prize could help to attract a broader pool of problem-solvers from around the world who could bring fresh insights into solving nagging problems here and bring problem-solving up to the next level.

There is also plenty of information on how to organise such contests well. McKinsey’s approach suggests giving prizes for clearly-defined societal benefits and following through to put resources into post-prize activities that convert the results into longer-term societal impact.

The Knight Foundation suggests using marketing to reach out widely to problem-solvers and tapping into social media to reach new kinds of applicants while also enabling people in the community to help choose the winners so that they feel engaged.

Given the huge scale of the challenges facing Singapore and how long some of these have persisted, now seems like an apt time to offer big prizes to solve them. If one of the ultra-wealthy here does set up a prize or two, the new solutions that result could quickly make Singapore an even better place to live in. ― TODAY

* Richard Hartung is a financial services consultant who has lived in Singapore since 1992.

** This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail Online.