Design to Improve Life

INDEX is a global non-profit network organization that awards designs judged as able to substantially improve important aspects of human life, worldwide. The INDEX Award, the biggest design award in the world, is presented biannually in Copenhagen to the winners elected by a jury of leading designers, design researchers, design writers and design thinkers from Europe. Past winners have included the Apple Design Team's Apple iTunes. I'm not exactly sure, however, that this one is in the same category as some of the other winners, like this year's "Mobility for Each One".
The iPod can allow you a choice of what you want to listen to, but Mobility for Each One can allow you to find employment, potentially the difference between life and death. For those unfortunates in developing countries who have stepped on a land mine - an estimated 40 people a day - losing a limb to the explosion can mean losing their abillity to hold a job.
Montreal industrial designer, 29-year-old Sebastien Dubois was moved by the plight of landmine victims who are reduced to begging. The prosthetic he designed replicates natural leg movement but does not copy human anatomy like most prostheses attempt to. It does make walking easier and even allows its users to run and play sports with it.
Most prostheses with the return of energy function typically cost from $1,200. to $4,000., prohibitive figures for the Third World, so Dubois set out to design a prosthetic foot that could be manufactured cheaply and easily in developing countries. He came up with his "Mobility for Each One" the award winning design that can be made for less than $10.00.
Dubois has since given his design to Handicap International, an organization that supports the needs of disabled people in countries affected by poverty and conflict, and the 1997 co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.