Focusing on health, the first Challenge aims to identify and develop solutions to issues around chronic disease management, mental health, and ageing. The Challenge programme’s initial partnership projects will see NESTA calling for both social entrepreneurs and front-line workers to come forward with ideas.

The first two projects are:

- A partnership with the Mental Health Foundation, with involvement from Mental Health Media, Mind, ReThink, and Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health, to call for project proposals. NESTA will provide a total of £500,000 for innovative projects from front-line workers, users and carers to tackle some of the key issues in the mental health arena. This might include new or improved services, breaking down the stigma of mental illness or encouraging the involvement of users in re-designing their own care.

Each of the Challenges will create a range of opportunities to tackle key issues. These will include seeking and funding ideas from front-line workers or users, providing capital and support to start-up social enterprises, or engaging the general public in a search for a solution to a specific problem.

NESTA is looking for potential partners with sector-specific expertise or a track record in social innovation to help devise, deliver or co-fund projects. These projects will be aimed at stimulating innovation in services as well as in new products and technologies, and will also aim to facilitate practitioner-led, community-led and third sector innovation.

Science and Innovation Minister, Malcolm Wicks said, "I welcome NESTA’s efforts to help boost social innovation. It’s vital that we look to as many different areas as possible in our bid for new ideas, so it’s great to see this challenge involving front-line workers and the broader community, who might have creative solutions which have previously gone unheard. We all need to work together to ensure the UK remains a world leader in terms of innovation, science and technology, because it’s these areas which will help secure our economic future."

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----Notes to editors----

For further information, to request an interview or to attend the launch event on March 8 2007, please contact: Damian Wilson at Forster on 020 7403 2230 or the NESTA press office on 020 7438 2643.

Click on Media Alerts to register to receive forthcoming news from Elemental Communications and its clients.

NESTA is the National Endowment for Science, Technology & the Arts. With endowed funds of over £300 million, our mission is to transform the UK’s capacity for innovation. We do this in three main ways: by working to build a more pervasive culture of innovation in this country; by providing innovators with access to early stage capital; and by driving forward research into innovation, with a view to influencing policy.

The Young Foundation is a centre for social innovation. Its goal is to speed up society's ability to respond to changing needs by developing and replicating new methods and models. The Foundation carries out research to understand social needs, develops practical initiatives and launches new enterprises to address them in fields ranging from health and education to marginalised communities and the hard to employ. For more information please contact Faizal Hakim on 020 8980 6263.

The Mental Health Foundation is a leading UK charity that provides information and policy recommendations, carries out research, campaigns and works to improve services for anyone affected by mental health problems, whatever their age and wherever they live. For more information please contact Laura Gibson on 020 7803 1130 or Fran Gorman on 020 7803 1128.

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