An Afghan girls’ robotics team has won an award at a prestigious competition in Europe. The team’s winning entry was a solar-powered robot that would help small farmers carry out tasks including seeding and cutting crops like wheat.
Three teenage members of the team won the Entrepreneurial Challenge at Robotex, which bills itself as “Europe’s biggest robotics festival” and took place in the Estonian capital of Tallinn from November 24 to 26.
The category requires entries that involve “solving a real world problem” by a robot that “customers would want to buy.”
Their win in Eastonia garnered a small cash prize, and they are also invited to take part in a larger U.S. event in May where they will compete for investment money to start their own company.
The team briefly found itself in the global spotlight last July when the United States denied four of its members visas to travel to an academic robotics competition. After a public outcry, American officials reversed their decision
