As part of the Edge 50 list, Apolitical is publishing a series of articles exploring a selection of these bold initiatives to learn more about the stories and strategies behind them.

Created by Apolitical in partnership with the Mohammed Bin Rashid Centre for Government Innovation, this list is an invitation to look beyond the usual playbook and ask what becomes possible when governments are willing to think boldly about today’s biggest problems.

Apolitical spoke with Myles Delfin, Founder of Bike Scouts, a volunteer-led disaster-response network based in the Philippines that deploys cyclists to reach places vehicles can't and relays real-time information to improve relief efforts on the ground.

In a country where typhoons, floods and earthquakes regularly cut off roads, power and communications, Bike Scouts has revealed that resilience doesn't have to wait for infrastructure. The innovation here isn't the bicycle. It's the decision to embed response capacity within communities before disaster strikes, so that when roads close and power fails, the network is already in place.

When you created Bike Scouts, what was the problem you were trying to solve, and what did you feel was missing from the way emergency disaster responses were working?

It’s actually the same problem we’re still experiencing. There are many reporting systems that government agencies and NGOs use to assess the impact of disasters on people and communities. The problem is, there’s rarely any way for people to actually have input into the kind of data and information that’s collected and passed around through these systems. So when we read the news reports, it always sounds like everything has been taken care of, but when you talk to people on the ground, there’s a completely different story.

Another issue is access to information and communication. People are often looking for information about relatives, friends or family. From being on the ground during disasters over the past 12 years, I know there’s often no system in place for people to access that kind of information. People sometimes have to wait hopelessly without knowing what’s happened to their loved ones.

That’s the kind of thing we set out to fix with Bike Scouts by using bicycles. In the Philippines, there are limited resources. Government doesn’t always have enough transportation or manpower, especially when disasters happen repeatedly. So we focused on something community-based where people can help each other and also support local government with reliable information.

Early warning systems sound perfect on paper, but in reality, evacuation is complicated. For example, during the Taal volcano eruption, many people didn’t want to leave their fishing nets, animals or equipment because those are their means of survival after the disaster. Official reports said that everyone evacuated, but many people actually moved to informal evacuation sites nearby so they could still check on their livelihoods. Understanding these realities is part of what allows our network to respond quickly and with the right context.

Why was there a need for local, volunteer-led infrastructure, and what’s been the most challenging part of setting that up?

In the beginning, I thought I would just gather my friends and people I know to form a network. But we ran into the same problems that existing systems run into: the system might exist, but there’s nobody able to act on it.

For example, local governments may have dashboards showing the data and the needs. They might know that 200 people need rescuing, but there’s no way to confirm the data or deploy resources because everything is centralised in city halls or government buildings. And when storms hit, electricity often goes out, and reporting stops completely.

Because of this, we realised we needed both a reporting system and a response network. Over time, we built a network of responders, such as EMTs, doctors, and volunteers with vehicles, boats, or other equipment. We don’t own these resources. They belong to people in the community who volunteer what they can, so that when a report comes in, we can mobilise the right help. But it’s taken time to build up.

Bike Scouts often arrive before official aid. How have you navigated the relationship with local authorities?

One advantage for us is that many leaders and members in the Bike Scouts community are also mayors, governors or councillors. Because of that, we’ve found it easier to collaborate. For example, we proposed a province-wide bicycle mobility ordinance in Eastern Samar. It was approved in record time. Instead of formal presentations in offices, officials simply went for a bike ride together, stopped for coffee and discussed the idea. They agreed it was important and moved forward with it.

The ordinance also grew from experiences during the COVID-19 lockdown. Bicycles were one of the few ways people could move around. We realised that bicycles can serve as a fallback mobility system during emergencies such as storms, earthquakes or pandemics. When mobility disappears, access disappears as well. Promoting bicycles for everyday use and official functions helps ensure communities always have at least one reliable way to move and communicate during emergencies.

The network has grown to more than 100,000 volunteers. What early design choices made it possible to scale?

One advantage we had was that I already had strong connections within the cycling community and industry in the Philippines. Instead of asking random people to join, we approached existing cycling clubs and groups. In the Philippines, these clubs can have memberships ranging from 500 to 20,000 riders. That allowed the network to grow quickly.

Our main Facebook group only has around 5,000 members, and those members are actually the leaders and founders of different cycling communities. But we structured it that way intentionally. Large online communities can be intimidating, especially for people who are introverted.

“We decentralised everything. The leaders connect in the main network, but each community keeps its own group chats, pages and local organisations. This allows us to scale while still keeping responses rooted in local knowledge and relationships”.

In disaster situations where outcomes are long-term and difficult to measure, how has Bike Scouts helped assess that?

In disaster response, the real impact is always long-term. The only place disasters look short-term is in accomplishment reports, where everything sounds completed. On the ground, that is rarely the case. People may still be without houses or livelihoods months or even years later. When someone loses a fishing boat or farm equipment, they lose their means of survival. So, it's very easy for Filipinos to lose their means to survive in the long term. This is why one of the most important things that Bike Scouts provides is local data. Things like satellite data are actually very easy to find, and that’s very helpful if you’re a researcher or a planner. But at least from our experience, you need local data to identify and address the types of support people need so they can get back on their feet in the long run.

This is actually where we failed a little bit in the early years because we weren’t able to collect or save proper data. A good example is the data we uploaded to Google Person Finder for our Typhoon Yolanda response. We lost all of that data because a few months later, they shut the project down, and we lost access to the information we uploaded. Then, a few years later, we started hosting our own data. But then we ran out of money to host it and lost everything again. So we’re constantly rebuilding.

In fact, we’re releasing an app now called Super Scout that I built myself using AI. I had some free time during the new year, so I decided to try, and by the next day, I had the app! A group of engineers from Bike Scouts is also attending a course to learn how to develop modular, low-cost technology for environmental sensors that even kids in a public school can build and deploy in their own community. We’re hoping to build a network of these sensors that connect to our app to create our own early warning system. The system will run on local-level data, and we can also record this for the future.

What advice would you give to public servants who want to build something similar?

Public servants are already in the space where they can do this kind of work. Many of the public servants involved in Bike Scouts have changed the way they think about their roles. Instead of focusing on political capital, they go back to their communities and speak directly with their neighbours.

“When people trust that you genuinely want to serve them, that trust becomes the strongest form of support”.

I also hope governments become more open to working with individuals and community groups who may not formally identify as civil society organisations. Many people simply want to improve the lives of their families and communities. If governments connect their resources with those local ideas, the impact can be enormous.