Innovation: Africa

Legal name: Innovation Africa

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
331186746
IRS 990 coverage
2012–2024
Official website data refreshed
Sep 2026
Forms available
Form 990 2024
Location
Rockville Centre, NY, USA
Phone
6464725396
Rating
78
Verdict
SUPPORTED
Rating confidence
Standard
Sector
International Development
Affiliation
Judaism

Official website

Reported finances

Revenue
$22,310,197
Expenses
$21,592,358
Assets
$8,138,733
Liabilities
$1,990,383

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.

Leadership & pay

17 people listed

Executive titles in this filing

  • SIVAN YA'ARI (CEO/TREASURER)

Highest reported compensation

  • BRUCE GIMPEL (CFO): $216,000 total reported compensation

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.

Overview

Mission

Unknown. Our UN-award-winning Remote Monitoring system, developed in Israel, is a game-changer for clean water projects, enabling us to deliver on long-term project sustainability. Our donors have a satellite view of the village and track live the amount of water pumped or solar produced at any given time. The system also sends real-time alerts if there is a malfunction, enabling quick issue resolution by our local team. SEE LIVE MONITORING OF PROJECTS. Click Here to Read Our Donor Privacy Policy :: 501(c)(3) registered innovation: africa 2026 :: all rights reserved :: NYC - Tel-Aviv Notifications.

What it reported doing in 2024

Through its employees in foreign countries, and resources deployed through its management company, innovation: africa israel, innovation: africa brings israeli solar, water, and agricultural technologies to rural african villages. Using solar energy, we provide electricity to power schools and orphanages allowing students to study at night and have access to computers, and we electrify medical centers, enabling them to work in the dark and provide proper healthcare to the communities. We also supply medical centers with refrigeration for the safe storage of medicines and vaccinations. The solar-powered water pumps installed in the villages allow for the production of energy to pump safe, clean water from deep below the ground in the aquifers, and make it available year-round. Each water pump provides rural communities with over 30,000 liters of clean water per day. The impact of clean water and power includes improved community health; better education for children and entrepreneurial opportunities for women who no longer need to spend their days trekking far to fetch water. Overall, communities are able to flourish with the addition of clean water and electricity. Innovation: africa also brings a uniquely israeli agricultural innovation, drip irrigation, which enables the growth of more food with less water, extends the growing season, prevents hunger and creates revenue-generating opportunities. We believe the core of each project is to create long-lasting and sustainable solutions, and our engineers developed a remote monitoring technology to detect system failures and train local residents to repair equipment so that villages are never left in the dark or without water. Throughout 2024, innovation: africa provided solar energy and clean water to 201 new villages, impacting the lives of nearly 1 million people from uganda, tanzania, malawi, cameroon, south africa and zambia.

Operating model

Revenue model
Donor-supported. 99% of the money available for current operations came from contributions and gifts.
Distribution model
Direct operator. The filing allocates 85% of reported program-service expenses outside its grant, affiliate-payment, and member-benefit lines. This expense classification does not rule out separately announced grant awards.

The verdict

SUPPORTED - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Few specific pay-setting methods are documented in the filing; unanswered boxes are not proof of absence and the filing reports few safeguards for money sent abroad.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 82
  • Transparency & Controls: 64
  • Accountability: 95
  • Sustainability: 41
  • Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 85.4%; rating input score 85
  • Program expense ratio: 88.3%; rating input score 88
  • Fundraising efficiency: $16.63 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 52; 52nd percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 62nd percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: 0 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 0
    • Compensation committee: Missing
    • Independent consultant: Missing
    • Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
    • Written employment contract: Missing
    • Compensation survey or study: Missing
    • Board or committee approval: Missing
  • Foreign activity oversight: 1 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 12
    • Claims monitoring procedures: Pass
    • Requires narrative reports: Fail
    • Conducts field audits: Fail
    • May suspend future funding: Fail
    • Requires financial reports: Fail
    • Conducts site visits: Fail
    • Requires grant agreements: Fail
    • May require repayment: Fail
  • Grant itemization coverage: 100%; rating input score 100; 72nd percentile among comparable filings
  • Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
  • Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

  • Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 66th percentile among comparable filings
  • Governance controls: 7 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 88
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Pass
    • Document-retention policy: Pass
    • CEO compensation review process: NotApplicable
    • Other executive compensation review process: Fail
    • Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
    • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
    • Audit committee oversight: Pass
    • Independent financial-statement audit: Pass

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: 3.2%; rating input score 47; 47th percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.38; rating input score 10; 10th percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.24; rating input score 53; 53rd percentile among comparable filings
  • Officer compensation ratio: 1%; rating input score 85; 85th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 27.9% per year; rating input score 100; 94th percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: 24% per year; rating input score 100; 94th percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 14.4% per year; rating input score 100; 79th percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • What they do: 1 programs and campaigns described on the official site
  • Where the money goes: 85.4% of revenue deployed · 88.3% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 15 of 15 board members independent · 7 of 8 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 1 filed program accomplishment · $19.1M in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $216K · 17 people listed · 0 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
  • Highest-paid contractors: 5 contractors listed · $7.5M reported
  • Consistency: 35 of 35 current checks pass
  • Schedules: 8 filed schedules · includes major donors, foreign activity, and executive pay
  • Filing history: 12 filing years from 2012 to 2024
  • Contacts: How to reach this organization
  • Money network: 1 filed money-flow record
  • Related organizations: 1 filed related-organization link
  • Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
  • People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.

Key Signals

Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.

  • High — Transparency & Controls: Pay-setting controls scored 0/100.
  • High — Transparency & Controls: Foreign activity oversight: 7 of 8 not reported.
  • Review — Financial Efficiency: Fundraising efficiency scored 52/100.
  • High — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 10/100.
  • Moderate — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 47/100.
  • Review — Accountability: Governance controls: Other executive compensation review process not reported.
  • Review — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 53/100.