26 November 2007
Announcing TEDAfrica 2008!
Chris Anderson and Emeka Okafor write:
We're delighted to tell you that there will be another TED conference in Africa next year, and that we hope to make it an annual event on the continent!
TEDAfrica will be held in Cape Town, South Africa, September 29-October 1, 2008 (save the date!), and will follow the format of this year's TEDGlobal conference in Arusha, Tanzania.
The conference will be organized by a wonderful local team, including TED Fellow Kelo Kubu, and the conference will be operated out of a new South Africa-based nonprofit organization devoted to promoting a better future for the continent, the TEDAfrica Foundation. TED will be supporting the foundation both financially and logistically, to help ensure that the event maintains and builds on the quality and success of the Arusha event.
We hope to see you in Cape Town!
And team member Kelo Kubu writes:
It has been an honor and a privilege to be part of the TEDAfrica process . The team is naturally excited to be hosting TEDAfrica 2008, and we look forward to the challenge of generating the usual TED cocktail of inspiration and magic. The task is undoubtedly a daunting one, but Africa provides the perfect platform and Cape Town the ideal location for yet another memorable event.
We look forward to welcoming the world to the southernmost tip of Africa to share, spread and nurture groundbreaking ideas that could open new possibilities to growth and prosperity on the continent.
Photo of Chris Anderson and Emeka Okafor onstage at TEDGlobal 2007 courtesy Soyapi Mumba/flickr
18 September 2007
Searching for humanity's roots: Zeresenay Alemseged on TED.com
Zeresenay "Zeray" Alemseged has been digging the badlands of Ethiopia, looking for clues to humanity's origins. Here he talks about one of his most exciting finds: the 3.3-million-year-old bones of Selam, a 3-year-old hominid child, from the species Australopithecus afarensis. In studying Selam's tiny bones, Alemseged is searching for the points at which we humans became human. (Recorded June 2007 in Arusha, Tanzania. Duration: 16:08.)
Watch Zeresenay Alemseged's talk on TED.com, where you can download it, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances.
Read more about Zeresenay Alemseged on TED.com.
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27 August 2007
Fighting slash and burn in Madagascar: African bloggers take action
At TEDGlobal2007, blogger Andriankoto Ratozamanana, of Harinjaka, gave a 3-minute talk on a developing environmental crisis: the "crazy slash and burn" of the Madagascar forest.
(To grasp the size of the problem, see this NASA image of burning in Madagascar, taken from the Terra satellite.)
This weekend, he emailed us to update the story:
A few days after TEDG, four Malagasy activists, led by myself, started a project in a remote village of the South-East region of Madagascar that strives to implement a local but comprehensive solution to the problems that the villagers are facing. All based upon the conversations that took place in Arusha.
The project is called Foko, and it is multi-pronged: tackling environmental issues that directly affect the villagers, building sustainable infrastructure, empowering the villagers -- especially the women -- to seek manageable solutions, and providing an efficient health care program.
We are focusing on battling deforestation and crazy slash and burn in Madagascar. Our actions are taking place in a village inside the Tanala region, in the heart of our most precious eastern forests -- freshly (June 2007, just after the conference in Arusha) added to the UNESCO World Heritage List.
Our commitment to this project is unwavering, because we feel now is the time to put into action in Madagascar the mindframe born from the TEDGlobal conference in Africa.
Foko is a nonprofit organisation funded entirely by grants and donations. As co-founder and Program Director on this project, I will be the one in the field at Madagascar, working with my three friends:
Joan Razafimaharo (blog: The Purple Corner, Montreal, Canada)
Lova Rakotomalala (blog: The Malagasy Dwarf Hippo, Indiana, USA)
Mialy A. (blog: Windows on the new World of SipaKV, Washington, USA)
We plan to drive this project via Internet and blogging.
Another TEDGlobal blogger, White African, explains how this project illustrates the transition from networking to action.
Foko's first project: Planting 10,000 trees in the village by February 2008, as part of the United Nations' Billion Tree Campaign.
14 August 2007
Tackling poverty with "patient capital": Jacqueline Novogratz on TED.com
Jacqueline Novogratz is pioneering new ways of tackling poverty. In her view, traditional charity rarely delivers lasting results. And commercial investors are also unwilling to seed the businesses and jobs that are needed in tough conditions. Her solution, outlined through a series of revealing personal stories, is "patient capital." This means using philanthropic funds to help "bottom of the pyramid" entrepreneurs get their businesses off the ground. Listening, truly listening, is key, she says, and the marketplace is the best listening device we have. The result: sustainable jobs, goods, services -- and dignity -- for the world's poorest. (Recorded June 2007 in Arusha, Tanzania. Duration: 18:35.)
Watch Jacqueline Novogratz's talk on TED.com, where you can download it, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances, including her talk at TEDGlobal2005 in Oxford.
Read more about Jacqueline Novogratz on TED.com.
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06 August 2007
Training our next leaders: Patrick Awuah on TED.com
Patrick Awuah left a comfortable life in Seattle to return to Ghana and co-found a liberal arts college. Why? Because he believes that Ghana's failures in leadership -- and he gives several mind-boggling examples -- stem from a university system that fails to train real leaders. In a talk that brought the TEDGlobal audience enthusiastically to their feet, he explains how a true liberal arts education -- steeped in critical thinking, idealism, and public service -- can produce the quick-thinking, ethical leaders needed to move his country forward. (Recorded June 2007 in Arusha, Tanzania. Duration: 17:42.)
Watch Patrick Awuah's talk on TED.com, where you can download it, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances.
Read more about Patrick Awuah on TED.com.
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01 August 2007
Premiere: Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala on reconciling aid and trade
After four days of intense discussion on aid versus trade at TEDGlobal 2007, it was up to Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the former Finance Minister of Nigeria, to sum it up. She asks for the discussion to continue, and to grow more sophisticated, more nuanced. And she brilliantly refocuses the concept of foreign aid: As she points out, most Western countries could not have been built without "aid" from Africa; their rapid development relied on Africa's natural and human resources. So when the US or the UK gives aid, she says, what they are really doing is giving back. (Recorded June 2007 in Arusha, Tanzania. Duration: 22:22.)
Watch Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala's talk on TED.com, where you can download it, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances, including her talk from this spring's TED2007 in Monterey, CA.
Read more about Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala on TED.com.
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01 August 2007
Premiere: William Kamkwamba on building a windmill
When he was just 14 years old, Malawian inventor William Kamkwamba built his family an electricity-generating windmill from spare parts, working from rough plans he found in a library book. In conversation with TED Curator Chris Anderson, Kamkwamba, now 19, tells a moving story of ingenuity and adaptation, and shares his dreams: To build a larger windmill to help with irrigation for his entire village, and to find the funds to go back to school. This talk inspired outpourings of support from the TED community and in the blogosphere. (Recorded June 2007 in Arusha, Tanzania. Duration: 04:23.)
Watch William Kamkwamba's talk on TED.com, where you can download it, rate it, comment on it and find other talks and performances.
Read more about William Kamkwamba on TED.com.
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31 July 2007
"The African spirit pushes through"
Guest blogger David McQueen was an enthusiastic reporter, photographer and networker at TEDGlobal 2007. He's a speaker, writer, music executive and youth worker whose busy blog covers issues around Africa and general personal development -- two interests that intersected at TEDGlobal, as he writes below.
Being very passionate about the continent of Africa, I love to put my money where my mouth is. I love to write about Africa, to meet people across the Diaspora, and to be engaged in discussions with people who have varied views on the beautiful continent. However, the one thing I was not able to do as frequently as I could was visit Africa, to get involved on the ground.
Earlier this year, however, a good stroke of fortune allowed me to be a fellow at the TEDGlobal conference in Tanzania. A place where young and old (am somewhere in between) movers and shakers for the next chapter of Africa could come to share ideas and thoughts. All of my friends were both happy and green with envy of the opportunity that came my way.
Having landed in the verdant country that was Tanzania, I got to meet a number of people who I had only ever spoken to online before. I met some celebrities like Bono and Larry Page ("Hi Larry, great software you have there!"), and was not too far from the president of Tanzani himself, and some scary-looking bodyguards. For those of us who attended, it was the opportunity of a lifetime. Amazing friendships were formed and continue on.
A number of weeks later, the conversation continues. Many of us have spoken on the phone, emailed, planned a potential reunion and collectively contribute online in our very own Google Group. The buzz continues. The videos will be released soon, and my wife knows that I will be back to the continent of my ancestors anytime soon.
Collectively, many of us dream of a brighter future. Of course, it won't be the easiest passage readdressing the history, turmoil and the massive health problems we are facing, but heck the African spirit pushes through and will reclaim itself, even if in part as a result of the meeting of minds of those in that glorious conference organised by TED. Watch this space.
Watch for the first TEDTalks from this conference, premiering Wednesday, August 1, on TED.com.
28 July 2007
From "The Art of Conference Blogging"
Ethan Zuckerman blogged TEDGlobal 2007 (and several past TEDs). Every session. Every speaker (save a few). Every day for four days. His near-real-time blogging was a crucial record of this conference. Many comments were made about his ability to turn out fully formed, thoughtful posts almost instantly.
Just as important, his posts helped other TEDGlobal bloggers begin the conversations that have continued ever since. The roster of TEDGlobal bloggers, working together, told the story of this conference, as he writes in the excerpt below, taken (with his permission) from his post "The 5-4-3 Double Play, or the Art of Conference Blogging" -- which offers his 10 keys to conference blogging.
Collaborate:
"Hash," writing about bloggers at the TEDGlobal conference in Arusha, used the Swahili term “harambee” to describe the ideal operation of a group of bloggers at a conference:
Harambee is a Swahili term that means “pulling together”. That mentality, the willingness to work together, was what made it possible to cover a busy event like TEDGlobal ... Some of us decided to take pictures, some did interviews between sessions and others decided to summarize the day. Everyone who blogs has their own voice, and I think it showed in the coverage. What could have been an amalgamation of everyone saying the same thing turned into a fairly well-rounded coverarge of the event.
My goal in blogging a conference is not to be the sole, authoritative voice of the blogosphere. It’s to do what I enjoy doing: writing detailed summaries of each sessions. But that means I can’t take photos of the speakers on stage, can’t interview speakers between sessions, can’t monitor coverage of the conference in the blogosphere. At TED, we were able to split up the tasks, so that Hash and Andrew took photos, Ndesanjo blogged in Swahili, Juliana did interviews, June and Emily monitored blogosphere coverage, etc. It’s a whole lot more fun to blog these events in groups, even if that means sitting next to someone trying to liveblog at the same time as you are, arguing about how to spell a word the speaker has just uttered.
Watch for the first TEDTalks from this conference, premiering Wednesday, August 1, on TED.com.
24 July 2007
"TEDGlobal was a seminal moment for Africa ..."
Next week on TED.com, we'll premiere the first talks from the TEDGlobal 2007 conference, held in Arusha, Tanzania, this June. Several bloggers from the conference will be posting here over the coming week.
TEDGlobal 2007 Fellow Juliana Rotich has been keeping the influential blog Afromusing for two and a half years, writing and interviewing about such issues as green energy, technology and many other topics around Kenya and the African continent. She also contributes to AfriGadget and is working on a forum for renewable-energy information exchange.
As the videos from TEDGlobal are released, I'd like to share a few thoughts on what I felt as a TED Fellow, an African and blogger; what this conference meant to me and other Fellows that I have been conversing with since this historic conference ended.
TEDGlobal was a seminal moment for Africa. It opened our eyes and minds to the ideas, people and technology shaping a continent. Glimpses of history from the segment "Looking Back to Look Forward," the present innovation in "Emergent Design" and "Tales of Invention," to the future in the segment "Ideas Worth Spreading." It felt like a precursor to a Wired Nextfest of sorts -- Africa edition, a "jumping-off point."
It was an out-of-the-box experience: boxes of tribe, nationality, continent and yes, even boxes of race. Chris Anderson and Emeka Okafor on stage reminded me of Seinfeld's black-and-white cookie. It was also about conversations between different minds from different continents, backgrounds and specialties. To have been in a forum where views and ideas about Africa are discussed with fervor, passion and engagement was ground-breaking, inspiring, enlightening and fantastic.
As an African, one might think that we would already know about the content presented at TEDGlobal 2007, but many of us could not have imagined the breadth and talent in Technology, Entertainment and Design coming from Africa. There was even a metaphorically poignant moment when the president of Tanzania, Jakaya Kikwete, removed his suit jacket and got comfortable to address the TEDGlobal audience. It was a moment that seemed to signal a peeling away of old ideas, seeing new ways to tackle Africa's challenges. Inasmuch as our minds were opened up to the potential of the African continent, on looking back I am reminded that the themes at TEDGlobal are indeed ... Global. As you watch the talks and see the ideas being shared, think of the universal questions that bind us all together.
For the African fellows like me, to have a video by a fellow African who looks like me, comes from the same continent, showing what they have done to change Africa ... It touches my mind and resolutely affirms a belief that perhaps was in the back of my mind, but today has been brought to the fore of my consciousness. The belief that Africa's next chapter is being written with innovative, entertaining and creative ideas that will shape a bright future. As we watch, engage in the conversations, and spread the ideas coming out of TEDGlobal, I am reminded that we are in one sandbox of a planet. We might as well learn and help each other. The African voices you will see and hear will have an idea, a message, a story that I hope will also touch you. Cheers TED, and thank you.
Watch for the premiere of the first talks from TEDGlobal, next week on TED.com.
22 July 2007
TED's Emeka Okafor on the conversation after TEDGlobal
As Program Director for TEDGlobal2007, Emeka Okafor worked with TED Curator Chris Anderson and the TED team to assemble a list of speakers that spoke to the heart of the new Africa -- the "cheetah generation" of inventors and investors, policymakers and bloggers, who are bringing new energy to the continent. We spoke to Emeka -- who's an entrepreneur and multiple blogger himself -- about life since TEDGlobal:
First -- have you recovered?
Yes, it's been a blissful recovery to see the continued strength of post-conference conversations.
Have you been reading the coverage of the conference since it ended? What do you think about the difference between the mainstream press coverage and the blog coverage?
The MSM press completely missed the zeitgeist that the conference tapped into. I wonder, did they go to a different conference? My thinking is that they proved to be one of the key reservoirs of preconceived thinking about the continent.
The blogosphere conversely provided everything that one would expect from the MSM and much much more. We tend to forget that not a single TEDTalk from TEDGlobal has been released yet -- it seems as if a good portion have. The blogs have excelled themselves in reportage, analysis, opinions, post-TEDGlobal initiative/project planning, etc.
What are some of the plans you've heard about that are inspired by TEDGlobal?
+ The AfricanLoft blog is hosting a carnival that is infused with TEDGlobal ideas.
+ Afrigadget has a proposal for "A strategy for supporting innovative entrepreneurs in Africa"
+ Jen Brea asks "there are tons of people out there doing projects who would like to know how to do them better? Or differently? What kind of forum could be created for brainstorming, critiquing, and improving upon existing ideas and models?"
+ Tunji Lardner, TED Fellow and founder of WangoNet, is looking at "unlocking products from various research institutes in Nigeria, we intend to scientifically bundle them and them market them."
... and this is just the tip of the iceberg.
In the week to come, watch for more news from TEDGlobal's continuing conversation, and guest posts from conference bloggers.
Premiering Wednesday, August 1: The first TEDTalks from TEDGlobal2007!
10 July 2007
TEDGlobal, one month on
It's been a month since TEDGlobal 2007 rocked Arusha, Tanzania -- bringing together Africans from all over the continent and the world, philanthropists and businesspeople, global citizens and key bloggers. The four days of the conference were up-all-night intense -- and many bloggers signed off on the last day with promises to write more when they caught up on their sleep.
Well, now they have.
Blogger Jen Brea turned in a sharp article for American.com that sums up the discussions around Africa sparked, in June, by TEDGlobal, the G8 summit and Vanity Fair:
Three weeks ago, TED held its first-ever conference in Africa, bringing together trademark optimism with an even more humbling sort of A-list.
Eleni Gabre-Madhin, a World Bank economist, returned to her native Ethiopia to start a commodities exchange to prevent future famines. Daniel Annerose invented software in Senegal that allows farmers to track market prices via SMS text messaging. Alieu Conteh built the first cellular network in the Congo, Florence Seriki, Nigeria's first computer manufacturing company.
Then there's William Kamkwamba, the undisputed showstopper, a teenager from rural Malawi who, at age fourteen, built a windmill from plastic scrap and an old bicycle frame that generates enough electricity to light his family's house.
These speakers were selected to support a thesis, painfully obvious but somehow radical in this age: Africa won't be "saved" by aid, but by the ingenuity and determination of its own people. ...
Conference speaker Nii Simmonds, at Nubian Cheetah, reports on a conversation with revered economist George Ayittey two weeks ago:
George asked, "so Nii, how do we get you TED Cheetahs to contribute to African development"?
I thought about it for a second and said, "I would be nice if TED sponsored fellows to their respective countries to use their professional work experience to help a business for a month or so."
I heard a pause, and George said, "well that is nice, but what about a fund, called a Cheetah Fund that is sustainable was set-up to help TED fellows or other African Cheetahs with funding for their respective businesses".
Wow, I said to myself, how come I didn't think about this before. African chiefs have been using this system for centuries before colonialism, we just have to go back to some of our indigenous roots ...
Speaker Ory Okolloh, who blogs at Kenyan Pundit and runs the public-affairs site mzalendo:Eye On Kenyan Parliament, is working her way through the sessions, using Ethan Zuckerman's liveblogging for her notes. During Euvin Naidoo's talk, she mused:
... wouldn’t it be great to have a one-stop shop website or something where you can access stats and info about investing in individual African countries. I thought the Investment Climate Facility was supposed to be doing that, but it appears that they are focused on other things. Niche blog opportunity anyone?
Lova Rakotomalala, from blogging family Global Voices, offers a quote-packed roundup from the Malagasy blogosphere (with translations from French to English):
Harinjaka got to visualize his dream of helping his homeland by attending the TED conference ...
He explains that he drew inspiration from the discussion in Arusha and he plans on leaving France and going back home to contribute to the turnaround ...
This is just a sample from the TEDGlobal blogging community; visit our list of TEDGlobal bloggers to find more updates and news.
And watch this space: Video from TEDGlobal 2007 will start appearing on TED.com this month.
04 July 2007
Incremental infrastructure for Africa
Extending the discussions at TEDGLOBAL2007 in Tanzania and the conversation that's currently taking place online, Ethan Zuckerman has a must-read post on the economic growth of Africa as exemplified by the very fast growth of mobile telephony across the continent -- there are currently nearly 120 million subscribers to cell phones. That growth has been breathtaking, and is central to many discussions about the future of Africa. However, Ethan wonders, it’s hard to know whether it is replicable in other sectors:
There’s a couple of circumstances that I think are critical to understand in the rise of mobile networks on the continent:
- You can build a mobile phone network one piece at a time. With a GSM license and a single tower, a company can begin earning revenue and start using this revenue to finance future expansion. An investment in the single-digit millions can turn into a multi-billion dollar business through reinvestment of revenues. That just isn’t true for creating container ports, major roads or large power generating facilities (...)
- Users financed a great deal of the infrastructure behind the mobile phone boom - specifically, they purchased the handsets (...)
- Sheer government incompetence helped the mobile industry by ensuring that most phone buyers weren’t replacing land lines with mobiles, but purchasing their first phones. It’s easier to sell someone a new, useful service rather than an improvement on an existing service (...)
I’m trying to figure out whether these criteria lead to an infrastructure investment strategy for Africa based on incremental infrastructure development. (...) African mobile phone companies are being forced to become power companies. In urban areas, phone companies have to equip every tower with diesel generators because of frequent power cuts. In more rural areas, where companies can’t rely on grid power, providers need to put in two generators - one to power the station, the second as backup. The cost of delivering diesel fuel to these locations is substantial - Russell Southwood calculates that a grid and road-connected base station costs $2,500 a month to maintain, while a very rural station might cost $20,000. (...) If mobile phone companies - or a similarly entrepreneurial entity - could begin building larger, more efficient power generating facilities, they could service local communities with power as well as with telephony. If there were sufficient success for this model, it might start to resemble the “electranet” that some have suggested might alleviate African power problems.
25 June 2007
Blogging the young windmill builder who rocked TEDGlobal
William Kamkwamba, the 19-year-old self-taught engineer who built a windmill power system for his family's home in Malawi, was a star of TEDGlobal 2007. As reported by Ethan Zuckerman, several TEDsters have pledged to help him further his education.
Now you can follow William's journey on his blog. Read about the windmill he built, his latest upgrades to his power system, and the people he is meeting who -- like so many people at TEDGlobal and in the blog community -- are impressed and inspired by what he's achieved.
13 June 2007
TEDGlobal: TED staff look back
TED's Content Producer, Kelly Stoetzel, helps choose the speakers for every TED conference. She shares her thoughts after TEDGlobal 2007 -- on the conference buzz, the connections and the small moments between the sessions:
I observed so many connections and conversations at the conference that felt like they were changing lives. Like William Kamkwamba, the kid who built his family a windmill. Tom Rielly showed him the Internet for the first time. He'd never seen it. Tom typed his name and "windmill" and said, "Look, this is all the information that's on the web about *you*." (As Ethan Zuckerman reports, the TEDGlobal community is getting together to help Kamkwamba get further education.)
It felt like the speakers were more remarkable as individuals, because of what they've had to overcome to achieve what they've achieved. Corneille Ewango is a perfect example. He has an accent, and he is a little shy, but people really connected with his story. It reminded me that we should take risks with speakers -- if the story is great and hasn't been heard, people will connect. I had to go on stage after William Kamkwamba, wearing a blindfold, to throw hats into the audience, but by the end of his talk, his story is so amazing, so inspiring, I was moved to tears -- with a blindfold on!
Especially among the Fellows, there was a huge sense of connection, the optimism and the connections. All the people, all of them wanting to make a difference in the same area -- it'll be really interesting to watch.
11 June 2007
Catching Up with AfriGadget/White African
After a security breach crashed his two crucial blogs, AfriGadget and White African, on Thursday morning, blogger Erik Hersman lost his voice for the conclusion of TEDGlobal. But now he's back up, and we're catching up with him:
From "Finally! A Mobile Payment System for Africa!":
Yesterday’s talk by Herman Chinery-Hesse was one of the highlights of TEDGlobal for me. He is the owner of SoftTribe, the leading computer technology company in West Africa, and a dynamic speaker and visionary. He’s been a trailblazer in what he called, “tropically tolerant software.” ...
... Herman stated one thing that I think will rub some in the diaspora the wrong way, but he uses his own life as an example:
"It is not dignified for an African to live their whole lives overseas."
Hersman blogged his own talk too -- he gave a 3-minute presentation on AfriGadget, saying:
Africans are bending the little they have to their will, using creativity to overcome life’s challenges.
The examples on AfriGadget showcase African ingenuity, the type of ingenuity born of necessity.
TEDBlog comments are still down -- and you're invited to join the conversation on TED.com, perhaps in the Theme called "Africa: The Next Chapter," where we've collected some Talks from past TEDs that touch on the themes from TEDGlobal 2007.
10 June 2007
The whole world is watching TEDGlobal bloggers
TEDGlobal 2007 has been largely reported and disseminated via blog. Which is not surprising, when you consider the sheer number of African and world bloggers who attended -- and how powerful their blogs have been in sharing ideas of the new Africa.
For those following the conference from home, it's clear that the blog coverage of TEDGlobal has the power to provoke emotion, passion and the desire to make change.
Ethan Zuckerman -- in a post-TED post that is a must-read for anyone thinking about Africa -- reports:
I got an IM from a friend in the States today who told me she’d found the ideas expressed at TED - which she followed through the blogs - inspiring, filling her with hope. I hope that reaction is widespread. ...
Home viewer beninmwangi makes the point on his MySpace blog:
... if you have not already guessed it, I am truly inspired, but as a blogger what inspires me the most is how the bloggers in attendance have taken the stage from the usual suspects -- the conventional media.
The African Uptimist writes:
Jennifer Brea ... made my day with her post "Writing a new story about Africa," in which she invites the reader to "imagine four days where you only use the good words to talk about Africa: words of forward motion, words of change...[four days of hearing] from the mouths of people who are out there living it, building it, succeeding (and quite possibly getting very rich) in Africa." I think it is safe to say that TED Global Conference 2007 was special in that it marked a turning point towards the 're-branding' of Africa.
Other blogs, including smallSHIFT, nobaddays and Magaidi, also shared their excitement over the ideas coming out of the conference via bloggers such as Ethan Zuckerman, Erik Hersman of AfriGadget and White African, and David McQueen (who notes "Well my blog has never been so popular. I must go away some more and write like nuts"). You can see the full list of bloggers here.
Thank you to BijanBlog for a nice compliment on our coverage here at the TEDBlog -- and for pointing out the connection between TEDGlobal's blog coverage and the Bob Thurman talk we posted this week on TED.com:
A few days ago, TEDBlog posted an earlier video of Bob Thurman's talk (taken on 12/06) about ... an all-connected world:
"When we can know everything, we can see how everything is interconnected -- and we can begin to feel compassion for every living being."
Wow.
09 June 2007
TEDGlobal 2007: bloggers' first thoughts from home
Afromusing sums it up:
TED Global felt like a seminal moment in Africa. I may have said this already but i will say it again. It was unlike any conference i have ever attended. Stupendous, challenging, interesting, eye-opening, heart-opening literally with Dr. Seyi Olesola and figuratively with Binyavanga Wainaina, Chris Abani and the music of Vusi Mahlasela. It was not uncommon to see people quietly wiping away tears during some of the talks. ...
Bankalele brought TED's perspective to stories from the G8 summit:
After listening to a week of stories on aid, development, and entrepreneurship, we emerged from Ted Global in Arusha to find one of the proponents of a new vision for development in Africa -- outgoing British prime minister Tony Blair endorsing shady dealings that involve Saudi Arabia in the name of strategic relationships. ...
In a post titled "Panic Mode," Mentalacrobatics shares a searing story (with photos) that must be read start to finish. It begins:
Well, well, well. I get back from TEDGlobal in Arusha to find the world has gone mad back at home. ...
After blogging every single session, Ethan Zuckerman is still processing:
Conferences like TED Global are only a couple of days long, but I find I can get surprisingly used to them -- wake up, absorb a mass of new and provocative ideas, have a few dozen conversations, stagger back to the hotel, rinse and repeat. And then, all of a sudden, they’re over. ...
... And now I’m enroute to Cape Town, wondering what we’ve learned, what might come out of this gathering.
Mweshi says:
I believe the people of TED provided us with a great platform with which to communicate with one another and if we can harness the power of those present at TED, Africa’s future is looking very bright! ...
And from a previous post: What happens after this conference now is entirely up to all of us who love our continent. To all TEDsters out there, let’s make this event the genesis of the cheetah renaissance!
Afrigadget/White African's Erik Hersman was offline from Thursday on --but he's back, and it's worth catching up. Also check out his photos from the conference here.
And our apologies to those readers who've tried to leave comments in the past week. While we're making repairs, please join the conversation on TED.com, perhaps in the Theme called "Africa: The Next Chapter," where we've collected some Talks from past TEDs that touch on the themes from TEDGlobal 2007!
08 June 2007
Initiatives and gifts announced at TEDGlobal: the bloggers report
TEDGlobal 2007 was studded with announcements of new initiatives and major gifts to the cause of Africa's next chapter. Here's a sampling, as reported by the blogs:
As Ethan Zuckerman reports from the final session:
Tanzanian President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete took the stage with Dr. Larry Brilliant of Google.org and Bruce McNeighbor of Technoserve. Dr. Brilliant announces his support for Believe, Begin, Become, a national business plan competition, modeled on the successful experiment Google and Technoserve operated this past year in Ghana. He emphasizes the importance of job creation and business development as critical parts of economic development. Brilliant describes the program as “tried and tested” in Africa and Latin America, where it accompanies investment with intensive entrepreneurship training ...
Afromusing has more on the press conference that followed:
President Jakaya Kikwete’s comments during the press conference and also during the TED global address showed that he is a leader with an open mind, engaging and committed to market liberalization. He struck me as a new breed of African leader, who engenders progressive ideals.
Reuters reported June 7 that Ethiopia's first commodities exchange -- modeled on the Chicago Board of Trade -- has set a target date to be in beta by the end of this year, quoting TED speaker Eleni Gabre-Madhin:
"What we hope to do first is to have a first launch of some kind of a pilot by the end of 2007. We hope to have a starting bell by December 2007," Eleni Gabre-Madhin, programme director with Washington DC- based International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), told Reuters.
Some 100 of the conference's attendees were TEDFellows, sponsored to attend because of their contributions to Africa's next chapter. TED's Director of Partnerships, Tom Rielly, helped arrange to send the TEDFellows home with some lovely parting gifts, courtesy of GE, Google and AMD, and Noah Samara from Worldspace, as Ethan reports -- and TEDFellow Soyapi Mumba Twitters:
Mac vs PC live in Africa! TEDGlobal2007 fellows to choose either Mac or PC as their gift laptop sponsored by Google and AMD. I'm a Mac!
As Erik Hersman at White African reported earlier in the week: Google also annouced its first sub-Saharan Africa hire:
Joseph Mucheru has been named the new site lead for Google Kenya. This was whispered to be happening, but at today’s Google lunch at TEDGlobal the position was made official by Francoise Brougher, Director of Google Business Opportunities.
And a grassroots effort is being formed to support one extraordinary young speaker; Ethan shares the details:
This isn’t the only generous effort coming out of the TED Global conference. William Kamkwamba, the amazing young Malawian engineer who built his first windmill at age 14, has captured the imagination of many of the people in the crowd. A number of TED attendees have banded together to support him fiscally to complete his high school education and go onto university. A TED staffer is travelling to Malawi next week to start working on finding tutors for William to help prepare him to attend a top high school in Malawi.
07 June 2007
TEDGlobal 2007 bloggers look back at world-changing days
People are packing up to leave TEDGlobal now, and the bloggers who came to the conference are thinking over the past four days.
David McQueen found new connections and strengthened virtual ones, and he sums it up in words and pictures:
I honestly don’t think Chris and Emeka (the organisers) REALLY understand how powerful this event has been. There have been connectors here, but most people have just dived into connecting with each other, creating partnerships and new friendships. A lot of dialogue about sustainable environments on the continent of Africa have begun and we are not just talking the sub Saharan countries but it would appear all fifty three in some way or the other have been affected by this. Congrats guys. Its been magnificent. TED Global is in the blood!!
Mweshi looks back to George Ayittey -- who divides African leaders into two camps, the fast-moving "cheetahs" and the wallowing "hippos" -- and then looks forward:
What happens after this conference now is entirely up to all of us who love our continent. To all TEDsters out there, let’s make this event the genesis of the cheetah renaissance!
An enormous thank-you to those in the TEDGlobal blog community who live-blogged or wrapped up or posted to flickr or in any way shared the experience of being in Arusha during this extraordinary week. And thanks in advance to all the bloggers who will get off the plane tomorrow and head straight to the keyboard to continue the conversation.
07 June 2007
Day 4: reports from the bloggers
Two final sessions, "Leadership and Truth" and "Ideas Worth Spreading," brought together economists, activists and the president of Tanzania. And the big ideas keep coming.
Mweshi reports:
Salim Amin is asking every African and those interested in the continent to help his for-Africa by-Africa 24-hour news channel, A24, come to fruition. With 900 million people on the continent, we continue to look to international news channels to provide information about our continent. ...
... It’s time Africa got its own 24-hour news channel.
After Salim Amin comes Ory Okolloh, a lawyer, activist and blogger from Kenya (and yet another TEDGlobal blogger to take the stage). NETucation digests her remarks, which begin:
Africa is a continent full of contradictions. You’re Harvard educated and you’re coming here to tell us what to do?
James Shikwati is described onstage as "a one-man think tank libertarian economist" by TED curator Chris Anderson. NETucation quotes Shikwati:
We need to understand how the world works, how the world thinks. The Aid debate operates under the constrained position i.e. the African person is in a box, somebody else must free him. We need to focus on releasing the African mind.
Tanzanian president Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete closed the early-morning session with a talk on African governance as it works on the ground. Ethan Zuckerman reports on what he said:
In the past, leaders would march in, declare themselves President, dismiss the parliament. They’d declare a ‘revolutionary council’, but there’s no revolution there. This used to be the way the continent worked. We’re moving beyond this, and beyond the leaders who led us out of colonialism.
Starting the final session of TEDGlobal 2007, President Shikwati got back on stage for a wonderful announcement, as reported by Ethan:
Tanzanian President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete took the stage with Dr. Larry Brilliant of Google.org and Bruce McNeighbor of Technoserve. Dr. Brilliant announces his support for “Believe, Begin, Become,” a national business plan competition, modeled on the successful experiment Google and Technoserve operated this past year in Ghana.
Noah Samara got up to talk about how he built WorldSpace, the first satellite radio network -- in a case where, as NETucation reports:
... for the first time technology was launched in Africa before it was handed down to America.
Journalist Dele Olojede talked about a decision he had to make in 1994: cover the birth of the new South Africa, or cover the Rwandan genocide? Ethan reports:
He decided that he’d give anything to see Mandela see his dream through, and he missed the Rwanda story.
“It became clear this was not an ordinary Central African horror story,” Olejede tells us, “and perhaps my decision was not correct.” Out of a sense of penance, he became “obsessed with the idea of Rwanda, with understanding it,” and has been travelling there ever since.
Patrick Awuah left Microsoft (pointing out that "While he worked at Microsoft the revenue of the company group grew larger than the GDP of Ghana") to found a university at home in Ghana. NETucation reports on his talk:
A month after launching he received and email from a student, “I am thinking now.” Another student asked “Can we create a perfect society?” after they were issued a challenge to come up with their own honour codes. This has lead to a vigorous debate among the students on campus. For the first in the history of Ghana, a woman was elected to be president of student body. This is real hope.
The amazing Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, former Finance Minister of Nigeria, closed the session. In a week of refocusing the aid story, she made a brilliant point, says Ethan:
African entrepeneur Mo Ibrahim dreams of the moment when Africa is giving aid. “But we’re already doing it - the UK and the US could not have been built without African aid. The resources - including human resources - have made those countries what they are today.” So when those countries are willing to give something back, we need to take it, but we need to use it effectively.
NETucation quotes her further:
Aid has to be a facilitator, it can be catalytic. China says Nigeria needs infrastructure and discipline to succeed. Within the private sector maybe aid can be used as a money guarantee. Her punchline is to help women get more access to resources - the research and statistics of this speaks for itself.The final question is what you will do with aid, the government, the private sector and the African as an individual.
Soyapi reports via Twitter on the party that folllowed:
Vusi on stage at tedglobal2007. Will be joined by the other 2 lady musicians. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala just did the last talk.
07 June 2007
Days Three and Four in Quotes
"This started as a grassroots movement. It happened without foreign investment, without government aid. It happened against the odds." — Filmmaker Franco Sacchi on Nollywood, Nigeria's $250M/year industry
“There’s no such thing as African science. There’s no such thing as American science. Science is science.” — Entrepreneur Moses Makayoto
"The US today could not have been built without Africa's aid. It was our resources -- including human resources -- that built that country. And when they try to give back, we shouldn't be on the defensive. The issue is: how we are using what is being given back." — Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala
"It's important for today's business leaders not only to know their business, but to have a passion for something that's meaningful" - Hector Ruiz, CEO of AMD
“If I do something wrong, someone will say so. There’s greater oversight and power in parliament than there used to be. And it’s more difficult for leaders to be as reckless as they used to be in the past.” — Tanzanian President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete
"No you're not." — Kenyan Blogger/lawyer Ory Okolloh, commenting on the "I AM AFRICAN" campaign, featuring Gwyneth Paltrow with blue stripes on her face
"If you're still feeling overdressed, feel free to remove your tie." — TED Curator Chris Anderson, joking with Tanzanian President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete, who had removed his jacket on stage, in recognition of TED's casual dress code
"Every society must be intentional about educating its leaders" — Patrick Awuah, founder of Ashesi University in Ghana
“Right now, the circumstances under which you are born determine your life - I want to see that change. As Africans, we need to take responsibility for the future of the continent.” — Kenyan Blogger/lawyer Ory Okolloh
06 June 2007
[TEDGlobal 2007] Session 10: The Campfire
The campfire. It's one of the world's most enduring metaphors, evoking simultaneously the safety of light, warmth, family, story; also the danger of darkness, exile, what lies beyond. The metaphor is all the more poignant here in Africa, where humankind evolved, along with language and storytelling and music and myth. And well-timed for our last evening together as a newly formed community, before we return to our individual lives.
So... for our final evening together in Arusha, we gathered around our stage-as-campfire, to take in four remarkable storytellers with 400+ new friends.
It began with Zambian-born, Italian filmmaker Franco Sacchi, whose upcoming film, "This is Nollywood," spotlights Nigeria's homegrown $250M/year industry, which turns out 2000+ movies per year, each shot straight to video on shoestring budgets. The stories? A little rough around the edges. The significance? Profound. "This started as a grassroots movement," Sacchi said. "It happened without foreign investment, without government aid. It happened against the odds."
Then Nigerian author/poet Chris Abani (best known for his novels Virgin of Flames and GraceLand) took us on a soulful and moving journey with words, weaving reflections on the power of language ("It's said that language describes the world we live in. But language makes the world we live in. Language is everything. Story is everything.") with powerful pieces of his own history (At 16, he published his first novel; at 18 he was sent to prison for the first time, and was "totally broken by it.") and reflections on the big questions in life ("The question for me is how do I balance narratives that are wonderful with narratives of wounds and self loathing. ... Transformation is a difficult and slow process. Sometimes I can say, 'I'm Chris Abani. I've been human for 6 days.'")
Binyavanga Wainaina -- author of the unforgettable satirical essay "How to Write About Africa," and publisher of literary journal Kwani? -- continued the evening's magical journey, with a series of stories, and reflections on the power of storytelling itself. A small sample:
Excerpt from Discovering HomeIf there is a miracle in the idea of life it is this: that we are able to exist for a time, in defiance of chaos. Later you often forget how dicey everything was; how the tickets almost didnt materialize; how the event almot got postponed; how a hangover nearly made you miss the flight....
Phrases swell, becoming bigger than their context and speak to us with TRUTH. We wield this series of events as our due, the standard for gifts of the future. We live the rest of our lives with the utter knowledge that there is something deliberate, a vein in us that transports everything into place -- if we follow the stepping stones of certainity.
Finally, South African singer-songwriter Vusi Mahlasela, who was a crucial artistic voice during the fight against apartheid, treated us to an utterly beautiful performance. His music moved me beyond words.
For more extensive descriptions of each talk, see Ethan Zuckerman's real-time posts on Franco Sacchi and Chris Abani, Binyavanga Wainaina and Vusi Mahlasela.
Watch for these talks on TED.com beginning midsummer 2007.
06 June 2007
Day 3 in the afternoon: reports from the bloggers
The after-lunch and evening sessions, "Connecting the Continent" and "The Campfire," were about communication and forming bonds.
Mweshi rounds up the early afternoon session, starting with Héctor Ruiz, the chair of AMD, speaking on AMD's 50x15 initiative:
AMD’s 50×15 initiative is a business venture and not a charity, it’s focused on simple, accessible, and human-centric solutions; it’s based on a “geo-sensitive” approach and is about fostering local, integrated, end-to-end ecosystems. ...
And Soyapi Mumba reports on Ruiz' personal message, via Twitter:
At TEDGlobal2007 AMD CEO: 'my father told me each generation shld be better than the previous'
More on Day 3 after the jump >>
06 June 2007
TEDGlobal 2007 Session 8: Health and Heroism
In a session punctuated by spontaneous applause and quiet tears, three heroes told their stories. If ever you doubt the ability of one person to move the world, any one of these talks would make you a believer.
Ernest Chijioke Madu is determined to bring world-class cardiovascular care to Africa, and stem the tide of elites leaving the continent to seek health care. Relying on foreign hospitals -- as most Africa elites do -- is neither sustainable nor sensible, in the case of cardiovascular disease, as most deaths occur in the 24 hours following a heart attack or stroke. "If you have a heart attack tonight, what will you do?" he asked. "Will you fly back to the US? To Germany? To France? No. You will die."
The hospital he'll build in Nigeria will be modeled after the Heart Institute of the Caribbean, the pioneering clinic he founded, which has a telemedicine platform, so other doctors around hte world can log in and lend advice. It's helped stem the tide of elites going overseas for medical care, while also offering care for all. "We have a policy of not turning away anyone regardless of ability to pay." (Can you hear the audience cheering?)
Environmental defender Corneille E.N. Ewango is a tropical botanist and conservation ecologist who risked his own life to protect the okapi reserve in the Congo forest ... In 1995, he started work at the reserve, home to elephant, giraffe, okapi, forest giraffe and more than 1,300 plant species, many of them unknown outside the park. There was a coup soon after, and Ewango found himself caught between pillaging rebel soldiers and government forces. Rather than flee, he focused on preserving what he could. He hung important equipment from trees, buried their 4x4 cars in the ground, and packed samples from 4,500 plants on the back of his bicycle, which he pedaled four days to Uganda and back.
A second war soon followed, and Ewango became a one-man reporting bureau, of sorts. Using an Iridium satellite phone, a laptop and a solar panel, he fed information -- on troop movements and war crimes -- to western NGOs. He won the 2005 Goldman Environmental Prize for his courageous effort. Now, in a more peaceful time, he’s managing a research project on global warming.
Our final hero, Leon Kintaudi focuses not on the typical African focal points of AIDS, malaria or TB, but on maternal health. The situation in his native Congo was dire when Kintaudi returned to try to improve it: The maternal and child death rates higher than most of the world (1 in 5 children die before age 5). So he founded the SANRU (Santé Rurale) Rural Health Program, a comprehensive program including preventative care, free malaria bednets, vaccinations, drug distribution, while also calling for society wide changes in educating children and promoting laws that protect women.
For more extensive descriptions of each talk, see Ethan Zuckerman's real-time posts on Ernest Madu, Corneille Ewango and Leon Kintaudi
Watch for these talks on TED.com beginning midsummer 2007.
06 June 2007
Twittering TEDGlobal
Beat the crowds in the bloggers' lounge: blogger Soyapi Mumba is Twittering the conference.
Is anyone else? Send a Comment.
06 June 2007
From blogger Jennifer Brea: "Writing A New Story About Africa"
Beijing-based blogger Jennifer Brea is one of 100 Fellows attending TEDGlobal. She's the Francophonia editor for Global Voices, and a prolific and powerful blogger about Africa. I love what she wrote about rethinking media coverage of Africa. Just an excerpt below. Read the full post here.
The first day's speakers--Euvin Naidoo, Andrew Mwenda, Carol Pineau, Andrew Dosunmu, Zeray Alemseged, and Newton Aduaka--took the story of Africa, the tired story of dependence, desperation, and despair, and tore it to shreds. They took the West's gaze, and killed it, stomped on it, mocked it, burned its effigy (Joseph Conrad to be precise) so that we could start an entirely new conversation using an entirely different vocabulary. We killed famine, death, hopelessness, hunger, tragedy, poverty and started using words like potential, opportunity, wealth, entrepreneurship, ingenuity, art, imagination, creativity, success, investment, growth, choice.
These are words the media use liberally when writing about emerging nations like India, China or Brazil, but not to describe some of the fastest-growing economies in the world when they happen to be in Africa.
Now imagine spending four days where you only use the good words to talk about Africa: words of forward motion, words of change. I'm not talking about bringing Tony Robbins on stage and dreaming of a better future. I'm talking about hearing from the mouths of people who are out there living it, building it, succeeding (and quite possibly getting very rich) in Africa.
It's been thrilling.
Technorati tags: tedglobal2007, Africa
06 June 2007
Day 3: Morning reports from the blogs
TEDGlobal's attending bloggers offer great roundups of the two morning sessions, called "Tales of Invention" and "Health and Heroism." Africa abounds in creative energy and innovation, a point made yesterday by Kwabena Boahen and elaborated today by two panels of inventors and health workers.
As always, Ethan Zuckerman has the speaker-by-speaker accounts.
Mweshi writes about finding innovation in new places -- and in places where, simply, no one has bothered to look. As he says: "We have so many great inventors on the continent, and yet we do not have any manufacturing plants":
What stood most about [Bola Olabisi's] talk was her showcasing of lo-tech inventions by some of Africa’s up and coming women inventors and innovators. Definitely an inspiration for a lot young girls and women on the continent and the world over...
... William Kamkwamba created a windmill in Malawi using locally available materials after reading a book called “Using Energy” by Atwater, M. et. Al. His main materials consisted of:
* old bicycle parts
* wooden poles
* plastic pipes
* an old car battery for energy storage, etc. ...
... Ernest Madu put his mouth where his mouth was by starting the Heart Institute of the Caribbean, a facility that has brought world-class medical services to the West Indies at 10% of what it costs to run and provide similar services in the continental United States. His argument is that through tele-medicine technology and education, we can improve the livelihoods of millions of people in the developing world.
Afromusing's detailed roundup of "Tales of Invention" captured a short talk by another TEDGlobal blogger, Erik Hersman of White African and Afrigadget:
Next, there was an excellent 3 minute presentation by Erik Hersman of Afrigadget -- the slides showcased some of the stories covered by afrigadget team, demonstrating how Africans solve problems every day by making tools and using local materials. The main idea he shared is that -- Ingenuity born of necessity. The quotable from him is that **Where others see trash, africa recycles**
Hersman writes about his encounters with two inventors: William Kamkwamba, a young man who built his family a windmill out of scrap parts, and Moussa Keita of Geekcorps:
There are two individuals here at TEDGlobal that it has been a great honor to meet. They are inventors, on the ground in Africa, creating solutions that will work in their area. These are great success stories that need to be celebrated, encouraged and supported. ...
Don at fifthculture says:
Today was about practical solutions and something else, something more ephemeral, transcendent. Under the heading practical solutions Seyi Oyesola pointed out that there is no system in place in most African countries for events such as accidents or chronic illness. His talk was titled "Beyond HIV and Malaria" and in it he stressed the need to get healthy, not just focus on HIV and AIDS.
David McQueen took this great pic of inventor and chemist Moses Makayoto, who is working to focus African innovation on local materials, local solutions, and modernized production.
And then there's Corneille E.N. Ewango -- for whom we need to invent a new term that combines "scientist," "hero," and frankly, "hearththrob." A sort of Indiana Jones of botany, Ewango literally put his life on the line to protect the Congo forest. Ethan has the details.
06 June 2007
Images fom Arusha: Opening the show
At the conference midway point, a few images from the TEDGlobal stage ...
Mali-born, Paris-based chanteuse Rokia Traore opens the conference with a traditional Griot song of welcome.
TED Curator Chris Anderson and TEDGlobal Program Director Emeka Okafor co-host the show from the TED stage.
Technorati tags: tedglobal2007
06 June 2007
Who is blogging from TEDGlobal 2007 in Tanzania?
Two dozen bloggers from around Africa and elsewhere are covering the sessions and the between-session action at TEDGlobal this week. We'll be sharing excerpts of the blogs' coverage on this site, and we encourage you to dive into the blogs below, both during and after the conference -- many bloggers say they are waiting until they get home to form their thoughts.
If you're a TEDGlobal blogger and you'd like to be added to this list, please send a comment.
Click here for images of the conference >>
Live-blogging every session:
My Heart's in Accra, by Ethan Zuckerman
Bloggers at TEDGlobal:
Erik Hersman, of White African and AfriGadget
David McQueen
Mweshi
Bankalele
Mental Acrobatics
AfroMusing
Soyapi Mumba, who is also Twittering
Andrew Heavens, at Meskel Square
Africa Beat, by Jennifer Brea
Rafiq Phillips at WebAddiCT
DNA
Harinjaka, in French
Fran Osseo-Asare, of Betumi: The African Food Network
Ramon Thomas, of NETucation
Ndesanjo Macha, who writes Digital Africa, in English, and Jikomboe, in Swahili
Mwenye Macho... in Swahili
Fifthculture
Ellen Horne at Radio Lab in Tanzania
ClassV
Sam Ritchie
Heresy
Reuben Abraham at Zoo Station
Bloggers who might be too busy to blog this week, but whose sites are always worth checking out:
Kenyan Pundit, by TED Conference speaker and blogger Ory Okolloh
Africa Unchained and Timbuktu Chronicles, by TEDGlobal conference director Emeka Okafor
06 June 2007
TEDGlobal 2007 Session 7: Tales of Invention
Day Three of TEDGlobal began with a series of pointed questions ...
"Where are the women inventors?" Bola Olabisi asked, as she walked around an international inventors fair, where she'd come on a slow afternoon in London, while pregnant with her fourth child and in need of distraction. She walked the hall all day, and failed to find a single woman inventor. Distressed, she approached the organizer to ask why no women were represented. "If you can find them, let me know," he said. And this sent Olabisi on what became her new life's mission, to encourage innovation and invention among women, and African women in particular.
"There was a lack of acknowledgement, recognition or even awareness of any African inventor or innovator." So along with founding the Global Women Inventors & Innovators Network she developed a Pan-African network for women inventors as well. And while there were many doubters ("Women inventors in AFRICA? have you thought about this carefully?"), every seat in her first symposium was full, often with designers of low-tech inventions -- floor tiles, wigs, household appliances, children's toys -- who may not have otherwise considered themselves "inventors."
The question, "Where are the African inventors?" echoed through the next talk as well, as Moses Makayoto called on young African scientists and engineers to stand up and be counted. An inventor and chemist himself, Makayoto invented the popular Mama Safi detergent, produced cheaply using local resources, and is now doing R&D into naturally developed malaria treatments and bio-pesticides, which can, for example, prevent malaria by attacking mosquitoes at the larval stage, and which can be created from raw materials found anywhere.
From Dr. Seyi Oyesola, a different question: Where are the well-trained African doctors? Answer: Overseas. Where they're better paid, better treated and enjoy modern hospital settings. In contrast, most hospitals on the continent lack vital equipment, and woefully fail to uphold sanitary standards. So "where do generally healthy Africans go if they need to be treated for things besides malaria, TB or HIV?" Oyeseola asks.
Distressed by the conditions in a Nigeria hospital where he came to perform a dozen open-heart surgeries (equipment was held together by duct tape; floors were dirty; X-rays were taped to windows for lack of a light table), Oyesola resolved to find a portable solution for bringing modern medicine with him. He co-developed the "Hospital in a Box" -- a pop-up, portable, plug-and-play system for off-grid medicine. Its environment-tolerant anesthesia makes surgery possible even in deeply inhospitable regions (or deeply ill-equipped regional hospitals).
His portable invention aside, the charismatic Oyesola stressed the importance of developing a strong non-emergency health care system throughout Africa. Emphasizing its economic significance, he quoted TEDster Hans Rosling: "You get wealthy faster if you're healthy first." (Watch Rosling's TEDTalk on TED.com)
The session's final question was asked by the entire audience, silently, to ourselves: "How on EARTH did he do that?" Chris and Emeka asked one of the TED Fellows -- 17-year-old William Kamkwamba from Malawi -- to the stage. A natural inventor, he built a fully-functional electricity-producing windmill from spare parts, working only from a photo in a magazine. After reading about Kamkwamba in a local African newspaper, TEDGlobal Conference Director Emeka Okafor spent several weeks tracking him down and invited him to join us here in Arusha, as part of our sponsored Fellowship program (There are 100 Fellows here). From the stage, William explained to TED Curator Chris Anderson that the windmill now powers 4 lights and two radios in his parents home. His dream? To build a larger version to help with irrigation, and go back to school. I have a feeling the next question for is: "How can we help?"
For more extensive descriptions of each talk, see Ethan Zuckerman's real-time posts on Bola Olabisi, Moses Makayoto and Dr. Seyi Oyesola.
Watch for these talks on TED.com beginning midsummer 2007.
Technorati tags: tedglobal2007
06 June 2007
TEDGlobal 2007 Session 6: Listening to Nature
The day's journey continued with anthropologist and geneticist Spencer Wells, who had us riveted with details of the Genographic Project, a landmark study he's leading for National Geographic, tracing human origins to their roots in Africa. By collecting DNA samples from people around the world (especially groups of indigenous people), he's determined the genetic origins of humanity going back over 50,000 years. "What we're trying to do is create a family tree for everyone alive today."
Simon Mwacharo followed, with the story behind the wind-powered turbine he invented. He's determined to bring power to the poorest rural areas in Africa, and that means turning toward alternative, renewable energy sources and inexpensive, readily available materials.
Next up: A living legend. Bi Kidude, the 90-something singer from Zanzibar, sang her heart out with the equally legendary Culture Musical Club of Zimbabwe, while young women shook and shimmied around her. All I can say is: Wow. 90+ and still rocking out. If that's not inspiring ...
Well, if that's not inspiring, well Jane Goodall always is. The legendary cast a spell on the room, with her gentle voice and steadfast mission: To save the chimpanzees — and the jungle — she loves, against the steady progression of habitat loss and climate change. "When I look at my granchildren and think about how we've harmed this planet since I was their age, I feel a kind of desperation." Still, she finds reason for optimism. "You can't come to a conference like TED and not have hope, can you? I'm hopeful, because nature is amazing resilient ... Seemingly dead tree stumps -- if you stop hacking them for firewood, in 10 years you can have a 30 ft tree.” A standing ovation, of course. (If you're following along from home, you can catch her 2003 TEDTalk here.)
For more extensive descriptions of each talk, see Ethan Zuckerman's real-time posts on Spencer Wells, Simon Mwacharo, and Jane Goodall and Bi Kidude.
Watch for these talks on TED.com beginning midsummer 2007.
Technorati tags: tedglobal2007
06 June 2007
TEDGlobal 2007 Session 5: The Risk Takers
It's a theme that's emerged throughout the conference: Identifying unmet needs in under-served markets can pay back in spades. And for those willing to take a calculated risk, a perceived danger becomes an unprecedented opportunity. In this session, three case studies of extraordinary individuals pathfinding in emerging markets:
For starters, there's Florence Seriki, who founded Omatek, a leading computer maker in Nigeria, West Africa's largest market. Like so many other African entrepreneurs, she was motivated by the idea, "Why can't Africans do this?" Alieuh Conteh took on a riskier proposition, founding a mobile phone service in war-ravaged Congo, just after the civil war. He envisioned, established, funded and protected what's become Vodafone Congo, now one of the fastest-growing mobile services in central Africa, with a subscriber base of 3 million and a valuation of $1.6B. Thanking Conteh for his talk, TED Curator Chris Anderson noted, “There’s money to be made in Africa.”
And Ted Kidane, co-founder of Feedelix, forged his way in new technologies and markets, creating mobile-phone software that enables text messaging in non-Latin scripts. (A challenge on several fronts, including display, text entry and transmission.) Initially developed for use in his native Ethiopic, the software can work in many languages and world markets (Chinese, Hindi, Arabic, etc.)
For more extensive descriptions of each talk, see Ethan Zuckerman's real-time posts on Florence Seriki, Alieu Conteh and Ted Kidane.
Watch for these talks on TED.com beginning midsummer 2007.
Technorati tags: tedglobal2007
06 June 2007
[TEDGlobal 2007] Session 4: Emergent Design
To understand Africa's technological future, TEDGlobal Program Director Emeka Okafor calls Russell Southwood to the stage. Publisher of Balancing Act and respected tech commentator, Southwood envisions a future in which Africa leapfrogs the entire industrial phase of development, and skips straight to a high-tech competitiveness. To achieve this, he identifies several "door-openers" to fundamental change, including ever-cheaper cell phones and plentiful, cheap bandwidth. Once those two commodities come in financial reach of more Africans, the continent could reach a technological tipping point, with much broader implications. "This revolution isn't just about tehnology, it's also a social and cultural revolution."
And now we step sideways to exercise other parts of the brain: Stanford-based bioengineer Kwabena Boahen gave a brain-twisting overview of his research, which aims to first understand how brains work, and then build a computer that works more like the brain. His beautiful simulation of neurons at work, and cogent explanation of the brain's networked approach to data transmission had all synapses firing.
From neural networks to urban grids... Architect Issa Diabaté took us next on a tour of African cityscapes that inspire his work. Clean lines and well-executed plans hold less interest for him than the messy, makeshift solutions so common in growing cities. "World progress needs a good dose of spontaneous human intelligence to realize that the answer to many of the questions we ask ourselves are just around the corner"
And from urban grids to fractal-shaped villages... "Ethno-mathematician" Ron Eglash set my mind on fire with his talk, explaining the research that led to his book, African Fractals. By looking at aerial-view photos — and then following up with detailed research on the ground — Eglash discovered that many African villages are purposely laid out to form perfect fractals, with self-similar shapes repeated in the rooms of the house, and the house itself, and the clusters of houses in the village. The shapes and algorithms vary from village to village (and not all villages are laid out this way), but always correspond perfectly to mathematically predictable patterns — the same sort of patterns we see in nature (in Acacia trees and fern leaves and snowflakes). Isn't that fascinating? And bizarre? And: What does it mean? I don't know, actually. But I can feel some theories coming on ...
For more extensive descriptions of each talk, see Ethan Zuckerman's real-time posts on Kwabena Boahen, Issa Diabaté, Ron Eglash and Russell Southwood.
Watch for these talks on TED.com beginning midsummer 2007.
Technorati tags: tedglobal2007
05 June 2007
Bono vs. Mwenda: Around the blogs
On the first day of the conference, the discussion between Andrew Mwenda and Bono electrified the audience and those following the conference via blogs. Here's what bloggers both inside and outside the conference had to say:
Felix Salmon's Market Movers blog for Portfolio.com gives an overview:
... the conference kicked off with [William] Easterly-by-proxy Andrew Mwenda. Ethan Zuckerman was there to hear Mwenda run down the standard Easterly talking points –- but at TED conferences, the points have a way of talking back. And when Mwenda challenged the audience to name a country where aid had led to development, Bono, of all people, stood up and named Ireland, in the days of the potato famine.
Bono was scheduled to speak [in Session] Two, and he devoted his time not to his own ideas but to rebutting Mwenda's. ...
And a report on the confrontation as it went down comes from fifthculture:
Andrew Mwenda [is] a journalist and social critic (read troublemaker – my kind of guy), and passionate speaker. ... [A]ccording to Andrew, all of us bleeding hearts from rich countries are doing the absolute wrong thing by giving aid to African countries. Andrew asked "has anyone in this room benefited or had a relative who benefited from aid?" A surprise answer came from Bono (all I could make out of the comment was "bullocks," but Bono would elaborate a little later).
Liz Dolan from the Huffington Post reports in detail:
Addressing the growing feeling that debt relief will not get African nations nearly as far as western direct investment, Bono said "You'd think somebody farted in here when the words 'debt relief' came up -- ooh, that's so uncool. Well, I will tell you that 20 million children in Africa are going to school today as a direct result of debt relief, 3 million right here in Tanzania alone.
David McQueen reports on the talks and the reaction:
... Talking to a number of people afterwards there were many mixed messages. Most believed that trade should be the primary focus but with incumbent governments still very dependent on aid that the focus should change. Personally I lean more to the position of Mwenda. Here is a man looking at the situation from the ground, and with possible prison sentences hanging over him from his native Uganda. OK he may not have all the solutions but his disdain for people looking down at Africa trying to solve issues from the outside in definitely resonated with me and many others.
Ecorica-Blog offers some more background on Andrew Mwenda's analysis:
One important remark: He admits that aid can bring humanitarian relief and can save lives, but he does not believe in the idea that aid can support long-term development of a society.
Live-blogging hero Ethan Zuckerman writes at length about both Mwenda's and Bono's talks. (The title of this blog post is borrowed from his indispensable blog.) White African also offers a good look at the talks, as does Ramon Thomas.
05 June 2007
TEDGlobal bloggers on the scene in Arusha
Aside from posting great coverage of the sessions and speakers at TEDGlobal 2007, the conference's many bloggers offer a glimpse of conference life -- the spark of meeting so many people with so much to share.
DNA captures the thrill:
"... today is my first day at the TED Global Conference being held here in Arusha, Tanzania. ‘Tis the first time TED has come to Africa and I am straight up meeting the most AMAZING people every few minutes. It’s almost like a brain overload kid. I already have a bunch of folks to followup w/ and some potential collaborators and I haven’t been here 24hrs yet."
Rafiq Philips, our Web AddiCT says:
"Haven’t picked my jaw up from the floor yet, All these passionate people. Wow."
Mental Acrobatics writes about the blogger convergence:
"It is wonderful that there is a healthy mix of bloggers amongst the TED Fellows. I’ll highlight the KBW members who are here apart from myself; Afromusing, Bankelele, Kenyan Pundit and White African. Ndesanjo is here as well running things on his home ground. Outside KBW Jen Brea and Andrew Heavens are here too."
And if you need visuals, check out the ever expanding flickr pool ...
05 June 2007
Walk-in Music, African style
Those of you who've attended TED in Monterey know that when you hear the Elephant March from Aïda, it means the doors for the Main Hall have opened, and it's time to scramble for a seat. (Over the years, this becomes a Pavlovian response; a single bar of that striding score touches off the rush of anticipation, inspiration, excitement (and let's face it, a bit of seat-finding stress) I associate with TED.
But for TEDGlobal, we thought we'd choose something more site-specific. (Yes, yes ... I know Aïda was an African princess. But still.) And so, welcoming us into the Main Hall each day in Arusha: A reinterpretation of the Tanzanian classic "Kuna Kunguni" (listen to it here) by the late master musician Hukwe Zawose, funked up in a version produced by Michael Brooks. The gyst of the song, for those who don't speak Swahili, is an upbeat invocation for people to come together, and work toward a better world. (Thanks to Bill Bragin for sourcing it!)
Technorati tags: TED, TEDGlobal, TEDGlobal2007
05 June 2007
The Day in Quotes (TEDGlobal 2007, Day One)
"We are all Africans. Welcome home."
— Paleontologist Zeray Alemseged, who discovered in Ethiopia the 3.3 million-year-old Salam, a 3-year-old hominid child, whose remains shed light on a key period in human evolution
"We need to reframe the challenges facing Africa, from the challenge of soliciting charity to the challenge of creating wealth."
— Journalist/Social critic Andrew Mwenda
"Tomorrow is the 60th anniversary of the Marshall Plan. I was going to talk about the Marshall Plan. But instead I'll talk about the Mwenda Plan, inaugurated today."
— Rock star/activist Bono, beginning a rebuttal to Andrew Mwenda, who argued forcefully against foreign aid in Africa
"Saying 'invest in Africa' is meaningless. Africa is not a country. There are 54 countries, each with its own value proposition."
— Financier Euvin Naidoo
"[Looking at media images of Africa], I thought, 'This is not the Africa I grew up with. The Africa I grew up with is full of life, full of optimism."
— Photographer Andrew Dosunmu
"Aid has never developed a nation. That comes from investment."
— Journalist/Filmmaker Carol Pineau
Technorati tags: TED, TEDGlobal2007 TEDGlobal07
05 June 2007
TEDGlobal 2007: What the blogs say (Day one)
"There’s nothing like a little controversy to get the party started. TEDGlobal hasn’t disappointed thus far." --White African
"I'm fascinated to see how the crowd - both regular attendees of the conference and first-timers - react to the program that Emeka Okafor has put together. (...) I suspect that the overall message of the event will challenge the preconceptions of all participants, African and non-African." — Ethan Zuckerman
"Meanwhile, down toward the southern end of the Great African Rift Valley in Arusha, Tanzania a kinder, gentler type of world event is taking place — Africa: The Next Chapter..." — Jewels in the Jungle
More blog coverage of TEDGlobal 2007
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