DAWN

‘Africa Is The Place To invest’

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Business

About the Africa Business Association

The Africa Business Association is an independent international business development organization. We offer access to the latest resources, information, and best practices in advocacy and communications for the African Diaspora and the African entrepreneurs in Africa.

We work to help you have access to news and events as starting points for constructive conversations and calls to action. We seek to cut through the froth of the political spin cycle to underlying truths and values. We want to be so focused on progress that together we can provide a credible and constructive generation of Africans that take seriously our previous generations and act upon all their wishes, our hopes and aspirations to make lasting change for all future generations.

Africa Business Association "DAWN"

PUBLISHER/PRESIDENT

Ricky Katsuya

ADVISORY BOARD

Earl 'Skip' Cooper, II, CEO, Black Business Association

H.E. Sheila Siwela, Ambassador

H.E. Kone L. Tanou, Ambassador

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

Ricky Katsuya

LAYOUT/TYPESETTING

Lion Communications

AFRICA BUSINESS ASSOCIATION NEWS

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Why the US is Backing the Africa Continental Free Trade Area

By Faustine Ngila

U.S. PRESIDENT

JOE BIDEN

finds

Africa a critical ally in his administration’s quest to maintain a strong grip on the global economy

The US is optimistic that if the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) is implemented the right way, it could help the continent solve most of its industrial challenges and attract more foreign investment.

In a press statement released by the White House during the Dec. 13-15 US-Africa Business Summit in Washington, the Biden Administration expressed confidence in Africa’s transformation journey.

“Africa’s integration into global markets, demographic boom, and continent-wide spirit of entrepreneurship and innovation present an extraordinary opportunity for the US to invest in Africa’s future,” it reads.

A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the US and the AfCFTA Secretariat on Dec 14. could boost trade and investment in the continent, while unlocking trillions of dollars from Africa’s hidden potential.

“Once fully implemented, the agreement establishing the AfCFTA will create a combined continent-wide market of 1.3 billion people and $3.4 trillion, which would be the fifth largest economy in the world,” the statement says.

The US says its government has helped close over 800 investment deals across 47 African countries for a total estimated value of over $18 billion in 2021 alone, while its private sector has pumped $8.6 billion worth of investments in Africa.

US trade with Africa totaled $83.6 billion in 2021. This is a fraction of Africa’s trade with the EU (€ 288 billion) and China ($254 billion) in the same year.

To play catch-up with the EU and China, president Joe Biden has announced around $15 billion in t wo-way trade in Africa, to increase investments in agriculture, digital economy, health, energy, infrastructure, and finance.

Breakdown of Biden’s goodies to Africa

The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), an independent US government foreign aid agency, has signed trade agreements worth $519 million with Niger and Benin. It has also signed a $825 million trade pact with Malawi, Lesotho, and Gambia. MCC is “working in 14 African countries with more than $3 billion in active compact and threshold programs and approximately $2.5 billion in the pipeline.”

The Export-Import Bank of the United States (EXIM), which has invested $7 billion in Africa signed several new MoUs with the largest being three with the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), Africa 50, and Africa Finance Corporation totaling $1.3 billion to expand US-Africa trade.

Prosper Africa is hoping to boost African exports to the US by $1 billion and mobilize an additional $1 billion in US investments in Africa. The US Department of Commerce says it has supported

Amb. Linda Greenfield

business deals between the US and Africa worth over $11.9 billion under the Biden administration.

In a period of rising prominence of innovations across Africa, Biden has also unveiled the Digital Transformation with Africa (DTA), an initiative aiming to expand digital access and literacy across the continent. The plan is to invest “over $350 million and mobilize over $450 million in financing commitments for Africa, in line with the African Union’s Digital Transformation Strategy.”

To support food security, health and energy projects, the International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) announced $469 million in new investments across Africa. The US Agency for International Development (USAID) is promising $100 million “to accelerate last-mile delivery of agricultural innovations” and unlock $300 million in private financing.

Power Africa and Prosper Africa announced the launch of the Clean Tech Energy Network (CTEN) to raise their energy investments in Africa to $500 million. The US African Development Foundation (USADF) promised a $56.84 million investment to electrify Africa in 2023.

The US Trade and Development Agency (USTDA)

announced over 15 initiatives that it believes will “unlock close to $1 billion in financing for Africa’s clean energy, digital, and healthcare infrastructure priorities and create more than $500 million in export opportunities for U.S. firms.”

The Washington summit is a follow-up of the USAfrica Summit held in Morocco in July. This was after four years of inactivity of the forum during Donald Trump’s reign.

https://news.yahoo.com/why-us-backing-africacontinental-115000422.html

Source: https://qz.com/the-us-has-a-plan-tocatch-up-with-china-and-eu-in-afri-1849897045

More information: https://www.state.gov/ africasummit

Image credit: twitter.com, au.news.yahoo.com, sabcnews.com

d-Thomas

Presidents Macky Sall of Senegal, Joe Biden of USA

Amazon to Shut Down Charity Donation Program

AmazonSmile

By Andres Tovar

Amazon said Wednesday it plans to shut down AmazonSmile, its charity donation program, by next month, as it looks for ways to cuts costs.

The program, launched in 2013, doled out a percentage of shoppers' purchases to eligible charities, donating more than $377 million globally since its inception, Amazon said. The company now plans to close AmazonSmile by Feb. 20, it said in a company blog post.

"After almost a decade, the program has not grown to create the impact that we had originally hoped," the company said. "With so many eligible

organizations -- more than 1 million globally -- our ability to have an impact was often spread too thin."

Amazon went on to say it will continue to invest in areas where it can "make meaningful change," assisting communities impacted by natural disasters, building affordable housing and providing access to computer science education for students in underserved communities.

The announcement is the latest sign of distress for Amazon, which over the past three years went through a huge growth spurt followed by a slowdown in revenue and a loss of $1 trillion in market value. To stem the losses, Amazon announced a workforce reduction in November that will cut more than 18,000 jobs.

In the past few months, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy halted testing on Amazon Scout, the company's robotic home-delivery initiative. He's also shuttered the Amazon Care telehealth and nursing service, as well as Fabric.com, a longtime online fabric retailer.

https://www.cnet.com/tech/amazon-to-shut-down-charitydonation-program-amazonsmile/ Image credit: allare-here.blogspot.com

https://experience.afrotech.com

FOR YEARS, BLACK WOMEN have been forward-thinking entrepreneurs who have repeatedly changed the course of history. Research has now shown that Black women are the fastest-growing group of entrepreneurs, but the lack of resources makes their entrepreneurship challenging.

According to reports from JP Morgan, Black women own nearly 2.7 million businesses across the United States, making them the fastest-growing group of entrepreneurs nationwide. Despite the impressive numbers, and the undeniable impact of Black women-owned businesses, research shows that Black women are generally underfunded when it comes to getting resources for their businesses. Between 2014 to 2019, businesses owned by Black women grew 50% between 2014 to 2019, which was the highest growth rate of any female demographic.

Exponential Growth

Although Black women are starting their own enterprises in large numbers, experts say that that could be a direct cause of the toxicity of corporate America, especially towards Black women. Tosh Ernest, Head of Business Growth at JPMorgan Chase said that the high rate of Black female entrepreneurship may be a reflection of a general dissatisfaction with traditional 9-5 work.

“High rates of Black female entrepreneurship may also reflect lack of opportunity in the traditional workforce – many start businesses to survive rather than pursuing market opportunities,” said Ernest. “Over 60% spend fewer than 40 hours per week on

Black Women are the Fastest Growing Group of Entrepreneurs, But There's a Catch

By Sughnen Yongo-Okochi

their businesses, suggesting that they have other jobs or responsibilities that demand their time and attention.”

Hurdles

According to a report by JP Morgan, about 61% of Black women self-fund their startup capital, because of a lack of access to capital. According to the report, Black women find it difficult to get funding, with a rejection rate that is three times higher than that of white business owners. The disproportionate access to capital has resulted in many Black women having to pay for many of their business costs out of pocket.

According to Ernest, investing in Black women requires the right resources that will grow their brand.

“Black women are positioned to play an increasingly visible and important role in the United States’ future like never before,” said Ernest. “To elevate their voice and their careers, and to achieve the American Dream of social and economic equality, we believe that entrepreneurship is key and that we must play our part in targeted efforts that enable Black women entrepreneurs to grow and sustain their businesses.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/career/ black-women-are-the-fastest-growing-group-ofentrepreneurs-but-there-s-a-catch/ar-AA15GHc8

Source: https://21ninety.com/category/ work,money

Image credit: PICHA Stock

Want to Change the World? Start by Changing Your Words

By Fiona McNae

WORDS WIELD POWER; they can significantly shape people, culture, and behavior.

Yet while we grow ever more aware that we live and work in a world of finite natural resources, the language we use in business isn’t helping us make impactful change. In fact, the words we use every day hold us back from creating a regenerative future, one that respects and restores the ecological systems we all depend on to survive.

Nowhere is this more apparent than with the discourse around sustainability. Despite being in use since 1987, the concept of sustainability—with its goal of maintaining the status quo rather than reversing the damage we have caused—clearly doesn’t help move us forward.

THE LANGUAGE WE USE ISN’T JUST OBSOLETE, IT HOLDS US BACK

Consider the typical language we use to talk about business success, goals, and visions. No doubt you’ve heard phrases like right to win; market penetration; ownable territory; targeting campaign; capturing value; demand; dominate the market; and first-mover advantage. You’ve probably used some of them yourself. But do you consider the assumptions that underpin this language, and whether they’re still relevant, helpful, and constructive for our work today?

All of these phrases are founded on ideas of winning and ownership, steeped in military references, colonialism, and competition. It’s an aggressive narrative, suggesting that in order for you to succeed, someone else has to lose. There is little room for partnership, alliance, or mutual success in this discourse.

It’s not just the win-lose nature of the business lexicon that causes issues, however. The very definition of what we see as business success and

how it is achieved could use some reflection. The language here refers to progressive accumulation, always striving upward and seeking bigger and better share of efficiency.

In this language, “bigger” is the definition of better, anything else is worse, and shrinking is certainly a failure. Financial measurements of sale and profit no longer connect with needs, but rather with the ability to stimulate desire. It’s a narrative that can’t tell us when we have enough.

We continue to use a definition of success that’s tied to infinite growth; an entire language that reinforces the way of thinking that led to the current climate crisis, not the kind of leadership that will lead us out of it. If we’re to describe a better world, and bring forward the associated behaviors, this language needs to change.

REFRAMING SUCCESS

Although shaping a regenerative future requires long-term, systemic, global change, we can take the important first steps today by changing the way we talk in our own businesses.

It starts with redefining what is “valuable” within our linear systems of production and consumption. We need to move away from the traditional view of progressive growth toward a place of plural abundance.

There’s an opportunity to create a language that reframes success as a communal or shared benefit and expands our idea of growth to encompass different sources of value—cultural, social, natural values as well as productive and financial ones. This is a true reflection of regeneration—the meaning that got lost amid the jostling to appear green.

Apparel company Pangaia sets a great precedent here. By describing itself as a “global collective of individuals, working together for a better future,” the business actively reframes traditional ideas of competition and success. The brand’s tagline,

WO RDSWIELDPOWER

“Designing an Earth-positive future, together,” is rooted in notions of noncompetitiveness and alliance. In this language, success starts to become conducive to regeneration. It is shared, self-perpetuating, and restorative. Making use of eco-friendly materials, using compostable packaging, and recycling some of its offcuts are just some of the ways Pangaia translates words into action.

But it’s not just small, relatively new brands that are starting to use regenerative language. Larger businesses are also taking steps to rethink their words. Walmart’s commitment to “reversing nature loss” is an example of regenerative language in action. The business is aiming for zero emissions across its global operations by 2040, with a pledge to “help protect, manage, or restore” 50 million acres of land and 1 million square miles of ocean by 2030.

Change is already in progress: Walmart has created a supply chain finance program that both enables reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and, in a first for the retail industry, uses sciencebased targets to do this in a way that aims for a 1.5 degree Celsius pathway. This program marks a tangible first step in Walmart’s journey to avoid 1 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions from its global supply chain by 2030.

SMALL CHANGES MAKE BIG RIPPLES

By moving the language of business away from competition toward collaboration, we create a new definition of success, qualified by values that go well beyond the bottom line. For example, something as simple as talking about value chains rather than supply chains is a small change that can add up to a big difference.

These new words recognize that the business does not exist in isolation but is part of an interconnected system with an impact beyond its own confines—on its partners, its employees, and the communities affected by its processes.

Target, for example, is updating its language to reflect its accountability as one part of a larger entity. In terms of working toward renewable energy goals, Target completed the conversion of its Vista, California, branch to become its first netzero energy store in March 2022. The retailer is also showing innovation when it comes to reducing

carbon emissions in its large-format stores, with store design that makes use of reclaimed wood, CO2 refrigerators, electric vehicle charging points, and rooftop solar panels in some locations.

Another area of language ripe for change is innovation. Rather than framing progress as disruptive and necessary to stay ahead, let’s see it as being responsive to a changing world. Materials innovator Bolt Threads leads here by speaking to the mutual benefits of its products for people and planet over profits.

Danone also speaks of collaboration, sharing its regenerative agriculture knowledge freely with partners to promote regenerative action— protecting soil, empowering a new generation of farmers, and promoting animal welfare. By 2020, Danone’s regenerative agriculture program expanded to 144,771 acres; and around 2.4 billion pounds of dairy milk (75% of Danone North America’s dairy milk) has been sourced from acreage within this program.

A NEW WORLD NEEDS NEW WORDS

Increasingly, people are acting more consciously and considering more than the final purchased product when making their decisions. Brands need to articulate themselves beyond their product or service to reveal their broader impact on the people employed, the livelihoods supported, the environment stewarded, and the social impact made if they’re to stay relevant. That both Walmart and Target are now in the top 10 of solar corporate users in the U.S. demonstrates an association between brands using regenerative language and taking positive, tangible, measurable steps toward regenerative action.

As individuals responsible for bringing systemic change to businesses, there is one simple place to start. By being alert to the importance of the words we use when we speak of success, innovation, and the future, we can begin to challenge limiting and harmful connotations. We can make language micro-interventions in our conversations, e-mails, briefs, and reports, which will start to shape new meaning, new metaphors, and, ultimately, new behaviors in business.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90825741/want-to-changethe-world-start-by-changing-your-words Image credit: payhip.com

BABBEL HAS BEEN AROUND for 15 years, with the goal of helping people learn languages to better communicate with each other. Since then, I’ve seen the way we interact evolve dramatically. People have gained a better understanding of and respect for our differences.

Remote work has also ushered in a new era of cross-border communication, adding more nuanced factors to how we interact. As a result, individuals and businesses are making concerted efforts to use more inclusive language.

Language is a cornerstone of how we understand each other, but sometimes the words we choose can be exclusionary or harmful. While we have made significant strides in being more mindful of how we interact with others, we’re not there yet. Problematic language is pervasive in words, phrases, slang, and idioms, and these habits can be difficult to break.

As we continue to think critically about how we communicate in both personal and professional contexts, there are several key areas we can adjust to create more respectful, safe, and equitable spaces.

STOP USING “YOU GUYS”

Social media has given women, nonbinary, and transgender folks a forum to open up about their experiences, prompting a concerted push for gender equity in the workplace. Still, sexist and gender-exclusionary language is often used unintentionally. To truly achieve gender equality,

It’s 2023. We Need to Stop Using Harmful Language. Here’s What We Can Say Instead

By Jennifer Dorman

there are some words and phrases that should be eliminated from our daily speech.

Gendered phrases like “you guys” or “ladies and gentlemen” might seem harmless because they are so common, but using these expressions may mean you’re misgendering or excluding people without knowing it. More inclusive options, like “everyone,” “team,” “folks,” or even “y’all” (in a more informal setting) are simple phrases that replace gendered terms and create a more welcoming environment.

We frequently use words that carry negative connotations to describe people who identify as women. Women in charge are often described as “bossy,” rather than assertive; their responses are pegged as “emotional” rather than passionate; women of color are deemed “aggressive” for expressing their opinions. These terms should be eliminated entirely, especially in professional settings.

People often assume that someone in a leadership position or specialized field is a maleidentifying person. Some riddles even illustrate our intrinsic gender bias. Instead of assuming anything before meeting someone, refer to them with gender-neutral terms or ask how that person identifies. Even better: introduce yourself with your pronouns, and keep them in your work and social profiles, like Slack, email signatures, and LinkedIn bios.

EMBRACE OTHER CULTURES

Workplace tools like Slack and Zoom, along with the emergence of remote and hybrid work, have made the world truly borderless. More people can choose to work internationally or join companies that are based outside of their home country. Babbel itself is a global company. Although we’re headquartered in Berlin and New York City, our team reflects more than 65 nationalities with people speaking dozens of different languages. We are just one example of an employer embracing a more multicultural workforce.

Of course, this approach means that more colleagues may speak more native languages. Even if a company operates using one primary language, welcoming people from across the globe also means being mindful of cultural and linguistic differences. For people working with international colleagues, there are some factors to consider to better ensure inclusivity.

Not all idioms or slang will make sense to those who aren’t native English speakers, either linguistically or culturally. Think of all the sportsrelated idioms that pepper the English language: “a ballpark figure,” “the ball’s in your court,” “run down the clock,” “hole in one,” etc. Many of these don’t translate directly into other languages or make sense to those who don’t typically follow sports.

In a business setting, it’s best to use straightforward, clear language whenever possible. This practice can help avoid misunderstandings or potentially disrespectful interactions.

USE CORRECT PRONUNCIATIONS

It’s also crucial to pronounce colleagues’ names correctly. Names often have cultural significance, and they’re an essential part of a person’s identity. If you interact with someone in any capacity— personal or professional—it’s okay to ask how to pronounce their name. And if you get it wrong, apologize. It goes a long way when building a connection with someone. Tools like Slack are also offering features that let users record their names or include phonetic pronunciation, another indication of the globalizing workforce.

DON’T USE ABLEIST LANGUAGE

Ableist language includes words and phrases that discriminate against people with disabilities, and it hides in plain sight. Many common sayings

are actually rooted in the marginalization of these communities. But these terms can be seriously harmful to the folks that struggle with these disorders, further stigmatizing or trivializing their experiences.

It can be difficult to identify ableist language because it is so embedded in our vernacular. Some examples to avoid include terms that reference mental health issues, like: “she’s crazy” or “this is nuts.” Saying “I’m addicted to…” also falls in this category, because addiction is a neuropsychological disorder. Instead, say “I love” or “I enjoy.” Referencing other diagnosable illnesses like “I’m depressed” or “she’s bipolar” makes it more difficult for those struggling with those conditions to properly articulate how they feel.

Using people-first language also helps reframe our thinking about ableist terms. This means putting the person ahead of a certain part of their disability. Change “she’s disabled” to “she has a disability.” This removes the linguistic emphasis on the disability and is less reductive to the person or people you are talking about. And of course, it’s always a good idea to ask how a person would like to be referred to, as everyone has a different perspective and preference.

The use of inclusive language is a work in progress. As we learn more about marginalized communities and individual preferences, we can continue to improve how we speak to and about each other. It’s vital to approach shifts in language with patience and grace. Not everyone will eliminate exclusionary language overnight, especially for ubiquitous phrases that don’t seem harmful at face value. But with effort and an open mind, we can make our personal and professional interactions more respectful, using the power of language as our guide.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90826455/stopusing-harmful-language Image credit: Dreamstime

Virgil Miller, Incoming President of AFLAC, on How Grit While Doing Grunt Work Propelled him to the Top of his Game

By Virgil Miller

THE TIME FOR WHICH I’m most grateful may have been the most difficult of my life—days of 15mile hikes with a 50-pound pack, lonely separation from family, and an unseen and unknowable enemy.

My time as a Marine made me more patient, more confident, and, oddly, more competent as a business executive working my way up the ladder of a $22 billion corporation. I have been guided by what my military service taught me, even if some lessons were inadvertent. Among them:

Don’t shun the grunt work

Whether it’s cleaning latrines or working an entrylevel call center position, the lowliest chore may yield the greatest returns. When you eventually are in a position to manage others, it helps to have the credibility of their experience. So, it’s wise to keep your head down and just do the work. But it also provides an excellent opportunity to…

Keep your head up

Observe, analyze, and cathect the operation, the procedure, the mission. Gain a firm grasp of expectations your supervisor has of you as well as what expectations your supervisor’s supervisor has of him or her. Making your superior officer look like a winner serves your interests as well.

Be the tops

Don’t waste emotional energy on phantom concerns like “job security” and “promotion prospects.” Just become one of the best at what you do, be it a rifleman or an accountant. The top few performers in any unit are always in demand, and leaders are constantly vying for their participation.

Your record is your credential

Business folks care less about the school you attended than what you can do. I grew up in a small Southern town, finished high school and became a Marine, served in the Gulf War, and only later earned some degrees from not-sofamous colleges. And every day I direct the activities of prestigious university alumni who have yet to do the work at which I have become expert.

Don’t typecast

My Marine Corps drill instructor was right out of Full Metal Jacket—loud, intimidating, profane. Then one day a fellow in our basic training group tried to commit suicide by slitting his wrists. After binding the wounds, and while waiting for the medics, the D.I. knelt in the puddle of blood, cradled the young man in his arms, and said, “It’s alright, son. You’re fine. We’re getting you out of here. It’ll be OK.” It was the warmest, sweetest voice—a voice I would have insisted, prior to that night, could never come from that man. And it revealed compassion and tenderness of which I thought him incapable. After that, he was no longer a “type” in my eyes, but a three-dimensional, fuller human being.

Walk the perimeter

In the Corps, you don’t just march. You take 14 steps, each 40 inches in length, with toe planted

on the turn, etc. Nothing is inexact or ambivalent. So rather than allow our company managers simply to invite our policy holders to “file a claim,” I have them go to the website themselves, click through the process, read each instruction, follow each prompt. What could be better explained? How can the customer experience be improved? That attention to detail, that emphasis on empathy, is essentially military.

Success is earned, not given

Does racism exist in America? Of course. Have I felt self-conscious as the only Black person in the room? Without fail. Have I been expected to work harder than some of my white counterparts? Occasionally. But two things can be true at once. I’ve noticed that every successful person I’ve known, regardless of race, has worked extremely hard and endured major setbacks. Expecting success without demonstrating commitment is presumptuous.

When businesspeople hear the word “military,” they sometimes hear “militant,” and assume such rigor, inflexibility, and uniformity would never work in a corporate environment. But if my career is any indication, most businesses would be greatly enhanced by the patience, perseverance, discipline, fortitude, and prudence (what we used to call “virtues”) of those who have seen the world through a soldier’s eyes. Such men and women know what it’s like, and what it takes, to stretch themselves beyond typical limits to achieve success in a way that is always productive, always collegial, and always faithful. Semper Fi.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/virgil-millerpresident-of-aflac-shares-story-of-how-grit-whiledoing-the-grunt-work-helped-propel-him-to-thetop-of-his-game/

Image credit: Virgil Miller, logodix.com

WHEN I STARTED my marketing agency, I had to make a lot of choices about the services I could offer. I found the hard part wasn't choosing what services to offer but which to not offer. It was easy enough to start with one service, but then a client would ask, "I also need a website, can you help me with that too?"

The challenge wasn't only around the services we offered but who we offered them to. Some agencies focus exclusively on healthcare, while others choose self-storage companies as clients. Some agencies work with startups, while others focus on large, established corporations.

No matter what type of client you want to work with, there's no right or wrong answer as to the niche you choose as long as you can carve out a space you can call your own. Here are three steps to get you started.

Step 1: Define your Goals

What do you want your business to be? What is its purpose? What do you want to accomplish through it?

Some entrepreneurs start a business because it seems like a nice alternative to a normal job (word of advice — you may want to think harder about this). Others want to build a fortune. Yet others want to change the world. None of these reasons is better than another, but if you want to build a business that generates $1M per year and makes you a nice living, you're going to focus on a different niche than if you want to create a $1B business that disrupts an industry. Therefore,

How to Find Your Niche

By Andres Tovar

the first question is, "What do you want?"

Step 2: Find your Zone of Genius

In his book, The Big Leap, author Gay Hendricks shared the concept of what he calls your "Zone of Genius." This is the area of focus in which the combination of our experience, skills, knowledge and interests allow us to do amazing things — things that appear magical to others. To find your zone of genius, start by listing all the things you're at least halfway good at. Then, look for combinations that are unique to you.

For example, there are tens of thousands of marketers out there, potentially hundreds of thousands, so when starting my digital marketing agency, it made a lot of sense to focus our efforts on the higher education industry to differentiate ourselves a bit more. The fact that I worked within the higher education industry as a digital advertisement manager made us a bit more unique. My genius zone has allowed us to work with colleges and universities across North America.

You can also take into consideration your personal interests. For example, a dream client for me would be chess.com since I use their platform on a weekly basis. If they were to choose a marketing agency, it would make sense for them to hire someone exceptional with digital marketing, but also work with someone who is an avid chess player, as opposed to someone who doesn't know how the game works.

What is your zone of genius? Where can you leverage your knowledge, skills and experience to make the biggest impact?

Step 3: Identify your Ideal Audience

Who is your ideal customer? If you could have an unlimited number of customers, but only one

Own It

type of customer, how would you describe them?

An executive coach might say, "I want to work with any and all executives," but do all executives want to work with that coach? They may face an uphill battle to get clients. One place to find your ideal audience of customers is to look at yourself. If you're a female executive who transitioned into academia and became a university president, maybe your ideal audience is female executives who want to transition into academia or those who already have transitioned and want to become the university president. In serving them, you would be able to serve from a place of deep experience and authority.

Many marketers talk about niching down and finding that one type of person who is the perfect

fit for your product or service, but there's a trap here. "It's easier to market to a roofer and plumber who are both in Miami than a roofer in New York and a roofer in Miami," says JC Hite, CEO of Hite Digital. "Just because you've sold to a lot of roofers in Miami doesn't mean roofers in New York are going to be just as interested." Depending on the nature of your business, geography may factor heavily into who your ideal audience is.

In conclusion, the ultimate goal is to create a market of one. A market of one is when your ideal customer only has one option — you. As entrepreneurs, the closer we can get to creating a market of one, the more profit we can produce, which allows us to invest and serve our customers better, improve our relationship with them and make an impact on the world. By finding the right niche for you, you'll be one big step closer to creating that market of one.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/starting-abusiness/how-to-find-your-niche-and-own-it-in-3simple-steps/441261

Image credit: ibm.com

https://naacp.org/convention

Davos 2023: Showcasing Africa, the Africa Way

By Ashutosh Pandey Davos, Switzerland

IT'S EASY TO MISS the Africa House on Davos' main boulevard called the promenade. There are no flags or a board with its name, just a monitor detailing the agenda of the day. The centerpiece of Africa's engagement in the Swiss Alpine town is housed in a blockchain firm's pavilion, perhaps to underscore Africa's embracing of modern technologies.

Once inside the hall, Africa comes alive; its colors, costumes and culture are on full display, and so is its entrepreneurial spirit.

"They say 'who will eat chocolates made in Africa,' I tell them, well, Africans will eat them," says one speaker at the panel discussion underway, as the audience bursts into laughter and applause.

The panel discussion is part of several events organized by the Africa House to tell the Africa growth story to global investors, while showcasing the opportunities on the continent.

"The turnout has been impeccable," Hyatt Antognini, chief commercial officer of the Africa House, told DW. "We have been hearing that a lot of people have already made some strong partnerships. It seems that things are moving forward."

SELLING BRAND AFRICA

While Africa and issues concerning it have been regularly debated and discussed prominently during annual meetings of the World Economic Forum, African governments and businesses have been largely absent from the promenade, where countries and companies have been setting up pavilions for years to attract investments and build networks.

The Africa House, which was launched in 2020 at the World Economic Forum's 50th annual meeting, aims to change that. It is offering a platform for African businesses and entrepreneurs to foster collaborations, build connections across borders, as well as showcase their activities to global leaders

"We're not waiting. Why do we have to wait for somebody else," musician and tech entrepreneur William Adams, known professionally as will.i.am, who is also the co-chair of the Africa House told DW. "Africa has lots of issues, but it also has lots of freaking awesomeness."

IT SECTOR IN FOCUS

Africa has been a late bloomer on the tech scene, but it's now eager to make up for the lost

◄ Africa House housed in a blockchain firm's pavilion

◄ Most events at the Africa House in Davos were a packed affair

Image: DW

time. African entrepreneurs are using technology to develop solutions adapted to their own realities. Global investors are also taking notice, as evidenced by the big turnout for panels on entrepreneurship and technology at the Africa House.

African startups, especially in Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya and Egypt, have seen a rise in funding over the years. They secured a record $2 billion (€1.84 billion) worth of investment in 2021, Disrupt Africa's African Tech Startups Funding repor t showed.

" We have a trend toward an increase in investment on the continent in startups among others because investors are present where you have a crisis, they see opportunities," Landry Signe, author and professor at the Thunderbird School of Global Management in Washington, DC told DW.

The African IT sector owes a lot to the success of the mobile money platform M-Pesa. Launched in 2007, the so-called branchless bank which pioneered mobile payments to drive financial inclusion in Africa has evolved into a payment behemoth, moving around 40% of Kenya's GDP.

"For a very long time the African tech industry wasn't even considered a part of the innovation part of the world," Mamadou Toure, the founder of Ubuntu Tribe, a digital platform promoting shared economy through tokenization of gold, told DW. "It started changing with the introduction of mobile

money, mobile payment, where Africa pioneered and led the world in terms of mobile banking."

BLOCKCHAIN BUZZ

At the Africa House, an informal gathering of policymakers and crypto companies, aptly called Crypto Kings Mixer, was another packed affair. Most present there agreed that blockchain technology could prove to be a game changer for the continent by promoting financial inclusion among other things.

The decentralized ledger that allows transparent information sharing within a business network is already popular in Africa, and so are cr yptocurrencies. Nigeria is among the world's largest traders of bitcoin, the most popular cryptocurrency.

While still a small market globally, Africa is one of the fastest-growing crypto markets in the world, according to Chainalysis. The Central African Republic is the second in the world after El Salvador to designate bitcoin as a legal tender.

"I don't think Africa is as represented as it could or should or is receiving the interest that it could," Toure said. "There's a bit of a misinformation about the real opportunities there, and that's why we have Africa House to showcase and articulate what this continent can do and more importantly, what it is that it's doing right."

https://amp.dw.com/en/davos-2023-showcasingafrica-the-africa-way/a-64458411

Namibia Pitches Green Hydrogen to Europe

By Ashutosh Pandey Davos, Switzerland

IT'S DIFFICULT TO MISS the Namibia House on Davos Promenade. The Namibian residence is plastered with posters exhorting potential investors to take a bet on its renewable potential.

Inside, the place is buzzing with activity, with murmurs of casual business interactions on the ground floor and exhaustive investment sessions a level below; Namibia seems to be making the most of its debut at the annual World Economic Forum meeting of the global elite in the Swiss Alpine town of Davos.

Among the things on sale: sunshine and wind. Namibia with a long coastline on the South Atlantic is among the driest countries in the world with 3,500 hours of sunshine per year. The country of 2.5 million is now looking to harness the sun

and wind to produce so-called green hydrogen from seawater, an energy source the European Union is banking on as it seeks to cut its reliance on fossil fuels to combat climate change.

"Here's a country that has the requisite resources. Here's a country that is serious at play," said Obeth Kandjoze, chairperson of Namibia's Green Hydrogen Council. "And here we are at the WEF [World Economic Forum], saying we are ready for business. So, that's the sales pitch."

Major Green Hydrogen Plans

Green hydrogen, which unlike grey hydrogen is produced by separating hydrogen molecules from water using renewable energy, is a key pillar of the European Union's plan to become climate-neutral by 2050 and wean itself off Russian oil and gas.

Namibia is using its debut in Davos as an opportunity to attract investments into green hydrogen, agriculture, and tourism Image: DW

This month, the European Commission, while doubling the EU hydrogen targets for 2030 as part of the REPowerEU plan, said it was looking to import 10 million tons of renewable hydrogen annually to replace fossil fuels in several industries and vehicles.

Eager to grab a pie of that cake, Namibian officials have been touring European capitals, including Berlin and Paris, over the past months. The southern African country, which counts diamonds and uranium among its main exports, has received expressions of interest from the likes of Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands.

The interest and inquiries have only gone up since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February, Kandjoze, who is also the head of Namibia's National Planning Commission, told DW.

Berlin has pledged €40 million ($42.6 million) to help its former colony develop the future energy source. The German government expects one kilogram of hydrogen from Namibia to eventually cost between €1.50 and €2.00.

"This would be the most competitive price in the world which would be a huge locational advantage for hydrogen 'made in Namibia,'" former German Research Minister Anja Karliczek said in August last year at the time of signing a hydrogen pact with the African country. "We need large amounts of hydrogen and we need it quickly and at low cost. Namibia can provide both."

German Connection

Namibia, one of the most politically stable countries in the region, has seen its economy struggle in recent years due to a sharp drop in commodity prices, drought, the COVID-19 pandemic and now the war in Ukraine, which has pushed prices and stoked food shortages. The country relies on imported electricity to meet much of its needs.

The country, which is the first in Africa to add environmental protection to its constitution, is hoping green hydrogen will help turn its fortunes.

It has selected Germany's Enertrag-backed Hyphen Hydrogen Energy to develop the country's

first mega green hydrogen project in the southwest. The project would ultimately produce up to 300,000 tons of green hydrogen per year.

The scheme is expected to cost around $10 billion, a steep investment in a country whose gross domestic product is just $12 billion. Kandjoze says Hyphen is already scouting for funds.

He said the government was also considering green bonds to fund renewable hydrogen projects.

"So far, we've not tested the market but we believe we've got what it takes to be able to pull this one off," Kandjoze said.

Green Hydrogen — a Risky Bet

Green hydrogen currently constitutes just a fraction of total hydrogen production. The technology is still not fully proven on a big scale, making it a rather risky bet.

There are other concerns. The electrolysis process to separate hydrogen molecules from water is expensive. Producing green hydrogen is even more costly when seawater is used, as Namibia plans to, because then the water has to first go through an expensive desalination process. Transporting hydrogen remains challenging.

"We rather take the risks for a better future, risk all that money to help clean up the environment," Kandjoze said. "We are a country that suffers excruciating drought one season and flooding the next. We better stomach that risk than simply wait."

At the Namibia House in Davos, the green hydrogen pitch appears to have intrigued potential investors. The investment session on the topic in the presence of Namibian President Hage Geingob was overbooked.

"We are overwhelmed by the interest that we are experiencing here in Davos from all sort of development agencies, funding agencies, technology partners," Sven Thieme, executive chairman of O&L, Namibia's largest privately held group of companies which is also building a green hydrogen plant as a pilot project, told DW. https://www.dw.com/en/namibia-pitches-green-

Diamond Company De Beers Appoints its First Ma

DE BEERS HAS appointed Molefi Letsiki, who owns Molefi Letsiki Diamonds in Johannesburg, South Africa, as its first majority-Black sightholder authorized to purchase rough diamonds

Israeli Diamond reports Letsiki is a secondgeneration diamantaire who graduated from the De Beers Enterprise Development Project for Diamond Beneficiation, which was created to help “historically disadvantaged South Africans” develop sustainable businesses and qualify for sightholder status.

Molefi Letsiki Diamond was among the companies in the first cohort of businesses in the initiative. De Beers Group operations managing director Moses Madondo congratulated Letsiki on his historymaking appointment.

“On behalf of De Beers, I wish to congratulate Molefi on this momentous achievement. It was our ultimate goal when we launched the Enterprise Development Project to have the project members become our sightholders,” Madondo said, according to Israeli Diamond.

IDEX Online reports Molefi Letsiki Diamonds was established in 2005 as a custom-made jewelry manufacturing business and will be among 60 businesses authorized to attend 10 sights a year in Botswana beginning Jan. 1, 2023, to purchase the company’s rough diamonds

According to its site, De Beers is one of the world’s leading diamond companies with expertise in diamond exploration, mining, grading, marketing, and retail. The company employs more than 20,000 people worldwide, many based in source

countries of Botswana, Canada, Namibia, and South Africa. Earlier this fall, the company named Lupita Nyong’o as a global ambassador.

De Beers has been in the jewelry business for more than a century, and its brands include Forevermark and Libert’aime by Forevermark.

Additionally, in 2018 the mu ltinational jewelry company launched a five -year pilot program to improve South Africa’s schools and the education of its children. In 2001, the company also launched a first-of-itskind HIV and AIDS Policy and HIV Disease Management program offering free anti-retroviral treatment to De Beers employees and their spouses. The program continues today and has expanded to other areas in South Africa.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/de-beersappoints-molefi-letsiki-diamonds-as-its-firstmajority-black-sightholder/

Image credit: Molefi Letsiki Diamonds, De Beers

jority Black Sightholder

By Derek Major

ElonMuskisBuildinga$20BCityinAfrica

By Complexob7 Admin Dawn staff: Article edited for clarity

ELON MUSK HAS just announced his plans to build an entirely new city in Africa. Musk’s vision is to create an inclusive community where residents have access to sustainable housing, free universal health care, and free education at the university level.

The Southern African government has approved Elon Musk’s plan to build his own city in Africa. The city will be located within the country of Botswana about seven miles away from Gaborone, the capital of Gaborone. With an estimated population of around 1 million people.

Elon Musk is thinking big, really big. By planning to build his own city, he is trying to solve some of Africa’s biggest problems by building a smart city.

He wants to create a solar-powered city that has renewable energy and he plans on making it 10 times bigger than the current cities in both population and scale…

Name Of Elon Musk’s New City

Elon plans on calling it Neo Gardens and hopes to get construction started as soon as possible.

Neo Gardens will be a green paradise but 8 million square feet of park space, 25% less open space than other cities because Elon doesn’t want space wasted away with concrete roads or parking lots but instead thinks everyone should live within walking distance from everything they need.

Construction Process in Elon Musk’s New City

Elon plans on doing everything for his new city through machines and robots so that means you won’t see any construction crews working there at all. These machines will take soil samples so Elon can plan where to build first.

Then when it’s ready, building components like glass, windows, or furniture can be produced

locally before anything else is assembled. So the logistics are incredibly efficient. You’ve heard Elon Musk has launched rockets into space and made electric cars affordable for everyone.

Elon Musk is an entrepreneur that does things differently. Elon plans on using drones, small flying objects equipped with sensors that fly around part of town looking for any malfunctions.

The main focus of Elon Musk’s new city is sustainability. It’ll have rooftop gardens with many trees growing throughout the entire city. Elon said this project was my baby and that was enough reason for him to spend 18 million dollars of his personal fortune on it.

Why is Elon building his own city?

Elon Musk is building his own city. Well, it sounds like something straight out of science fiction it’s actually not. Right now on Twitter, he has been tweeting about potentially building his own city on Mars.

However, what really means to say is that he’s going to build a city here on earth and make sure it works with modern technology and his sustainable energy…

Elon Musk is known for making bold moves but in the entire city, that seems like too big of a challenge for most human beings, especially one man singlehandedly. But Elon Musk proves us wrong once again.

A news report from Bloomberg states that he’s actually looking into building an entire city based entirely around renewable energy sources such as solar power. Elon Musk does love cities though. At least that’s what he said during a Ted Talk back in 2010.

When he made claims about cars being inefficient and how they were bad for the environment because they produced carbon dioxide. Elon sees

it as his duty to do whatever he can personally to reduce global warming and sees electric cars as better than combustion engines

So why is Elon Musk building his own city in Africa?

Well, it turns out [he] wants to tackle one of his regrets head on which is ending world poverty. It has huge potential to lift humanity up. So let’s take a really big step and not assume anyone will follow.

You know Elon Musk isn’t just thinking about building a city in Africa for **** and giggles. He actually believes it will lift humans up out of poverty and give them hope for their futures.

Plus it may end up doing away with corruption too. Today it’s estimated that over eight hundred million people live in extreme poverty across our planet. Elon Musk wants to change that. Elon Musk hopes to deliver on his promise to create a city in Africa. …One that is run completely on clean energy and has homes for everyone.

How does Elon plan to build the whole city by himself?

The plan is to build a complete city from scratch including homes, businesses and even electricity. The goal is to help alleviate property in Africa. A country where people can spend their whole lives without ever using electricity.

Elon says that he’s working with private investors to fund his new venture and has already made plans for solar energy installations in each home in order to keep costs low for all residents.

However, at present, there are no concrete dates or deadlines given on when construction will begin or Elon’s vision will be completed. Until then, we eagerly await Elon and his team’s next big announcement about how he intends to make dreams reality and alleviate world poverty along the way.

We are entering a new era of urbanization with cities quickly becoming home to more than half of our global population.

In order to accommodate growing populations and changing lifestyles, we must explore fresh concepts in sustainable city planning and design including vertical farming, underground houses and eco-friendly public transportation. That’s why Tesla CEO Elon Musk has proposed building his own city on land currently owned by the Southern African government. The details are still up in the air…

https://complexob7.com/elon-musk-is-building-a20b-city-in-africa/

Image credit: indigenousnation.org

Meta'sMetaverseHypeinAfricaMayNotBeartheDesired

By Faustine Ngila

META WANTS TO SPREAD the metaverse hype in 16 African countries, and has announced a series of programs under its global extended reality (XR) fund to grow metaverse talent.

But the challenge is that for many Africans, the concept of the metaverse is still too theoretical with buy-in relying on people seeing how it can enhance their livelihoods or businesses. Coupled with the restrictively high costs of VR headsets, slow internet speeds, and high costs of data on the continent, the metaverse will face a bumpy ride in Africa.

“It’s good for the future but we’re are not there yet, economically we’re struggling. People hardly understand the concept of the metaverse. If you tweet about the metaverse in Africa people get curious but are confused,” founder of Nairobi-based social media analytics startup Brand Moran, Egline Samoei tells Quartz. “Those who understand it don’t know how to merge it with their businesses.”

Meta’s Africa metaverse ambitions

Phil Oduor, policy programs lead for Africa at Meta says that augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) are core to continent’s metaverse future and the company will be pumping $50 million into a two-year training program which aims “to support African XR talent who are building innovative solutions that demonstrate the various aspects of the metaverse in Africa.”

The company is partnering with two startups–Nairobi-based BlackRhino VR and Lagos-based Imisi 3D –and hopes they will help it lodge a successful continental drift into the metaverse. The existence of only two players pioneering VR tech in the continent speaks volumes about Africa’s preparedness for an immersive universe where

Gen X and Gen Z are expected to spend up to five hours in the next five years.

What is the point of the metaverse in Africa?

The concept of the metaverse is still new in Africa, and sales of VR headsets, VR glasses, and Google cardboards have been low because many people are yet to understand what living in the metaverse actually means.

Meta has no plans to make its VR devices affordable for Africa and is in fact doing the converse–raising the price by $100. Meta’s Oculus Quest 2, for instance, costs $396 in Nairobi, a price too high for a continent undergoing economic strife. Curiosity notwithstanding, many Africans cannot afford to join the metaverse obsession and Meta’s efforts may not bear the results it is targeting.

Nick Chumba a 20-year-old web designer finds no inspiration in the metaverse. “Why would I need to purchase a VR headset? Why would I buy designer

clothes for a digital avatar? Even the idea of selling digital land, what’s the real value?” Chumba says, highlighting the fact that even African techies are not sure how the metaverse will serve them.

Africa’s internet does not support heavy immersive streaming

Immersive experiences with high-definition video applications require internet data speeds of between 80-100 megabits per second while low resolution 360-degree experiences available in most VR head-mounted displays require at least 25 megabits per second. Africa’s average internet speed is 5.74 Mbps, and the cost is highest in the world. A number of countries are testing 5G networks, but 3G and 4G networks are the mainstay in the whole of Africa.

For Savio Wambugu, a United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (Uneca) tech consultant who serves in the advisory board of Kenya’s association of countrywide innovation hubs, Africa is the most

promising place to implement the metaverse, but there’s a lot of work to be done in improving infrastructure and growing metaverse talent.

“Big tech companies are setting base in Africa. This has brought a ripple effect on the skillset needed to build, implement, and adapt to the metaverse. The challenge now is the infrastructural internet capability to support all this which should be upgraded,” he tells Quartz.

At the end, many Africans believe, it’s all about the physical life they’re living and not the virtual one. And they already have enough daily challenges to deal with. But Meta remains optimistic that its efforts to grow metaverse skillsets could help it inject an additional $40 billion into Africa’s GDP in the next decade.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/ meta-s-metaverse-hype-in-africa-may-not-bearthe-desired-results/ar-AA112PZA

Source: https://qz.com/meta-wants-to-bring-themetaverse-to-africans-through-t-1849886796

Image credit: BlackRhino VR, Twitter, mycricketdeal.com

Lagos Gets a New Elevated Rail Network

By bird-Africa no filter.

THE FIRST PHASE of a light rail system that is set to transform commuting in Nigeria’s economic capital, has been commissioned.

The Blue Line project in Lagos is a 27 km rail system that upon completion is expected to carry more than 500,000 passengers.

The first phase traverses five stations covering a distance of 13 km and has the capacity to move 250,000 passengers daily. The state government said that it had taken delivery of three sets of wagons that will be used for passenger operations.

“Over the last two decades, that masterplan has been faithfully implemented by successive administrations. Today, we are making history with the completion of the historic rail line, which is the first phase of the Blue Line,” Lagos State Governor, Sanwo-Olu told media representatives during the test ride aboard the electric-powered rail infrastructure earlier in December.

Lagos’ transport master plan

The governor revived the project as part of the state’s development agenda. The Blue Line is one of six rail lines and one monorail, 14 Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) corridors, over 20 water routes, and a number of major new roads that are part of a strategic transport master plan developed by the Bola Tinubu administration in 2005.

Construction work for the Blue Line rail project began in 2010. However, funding issues and

neglect by successive administrations stalled the delivery of the project, which is now being financed solely by the state.

According to the governor, passenger operations will commence once the line has been fully tested.

The construction of an Independent Power Project (IPP) is already underway to ensure that the rail system runs on its own power grid.

The Lagos Metropolitan Area Transport Authority (LAMATA) was charged with overseeing the construction.

“Passengers will use the state’s unified electronic payment system known as Cowry Card, currently being used for BRT and regulated ferry services,” said Abimbola Akinajo, Managing Director of LAMATA, as regards train fares.

She described the completion of the rail infrastructure as “fantastic,” adding that the development marked a new chapter for Lagos.

The state government said construction of the second phase of the Blue Line rail project, running from Mile 2 to Okokomaiko—both on the Lagos Mainland—will commence in the first quarter of 2023 after official approval of the first phase for passenger operations in January. The construction of the light rail projects has been split into phases to ease implementation.

https://www.yahoo.com/now/lagos-gets-elevatedrail-network-072000609.html

THE WORLD BANK projects an impressive 2023 for Senegal’s economy, thanks to a thriving oil and gas industry.

“After slowing to 4.8% in 2022, growth in Senegal is projected to jump to 8.0% in 2023 and firm to 10.5% in 2024,” the World Bank states. Next year’s growth will surpass the country’s historical high of 8.9% recorded back in 1976.

Senegal’s rise is attributable to a stronger export portfolio due to a pick-up in private investment in the mining sector with the first gas project coming onstream by the end of 2023.

The west African nation projects to earn $1.4 billion in oil and gas revenue by 2025, with its Greater Tortue Ahmeyim gas project set to produce 7.5 million tons of liquefied natural gas in the first and second phases.

Senegal’s growing mining sector produces phosphates, gold, mineral sand, manganese,

World Bank Projects Impressive Growth for Senegal in 2023

By Faustine Ngila

and industrial clay that accounted for 40% of the country’s export revenue in 2019. Its GDP stood at $27.6 billion in 2021 with a population of 17.9 million as of Jan. 10.

Côte d’Ivoire is projected to bounce back from 5.7% in 2022 to 6.8% this year, while Cameroon will have a gradual growth of 4.3% in 2023 and 4.6% in 2024, powered by “investment and private consumption.”

Growth of Anchor Economies will Slow Down

Excluding Nigeria, the western and central Africa subregion is projected to grow at 5.0% in 2023 (up from 4.2% in 2022.) Nigeria’s economic growth is expected to slow down with the World Bank stating that the country will continue “to suffer from an underperforming oil sector.”

The report projects a growth in eastern and southern African subregion of 4.5% this year and 5.0% in 2024. Western and

central African economies will grow at 5.0% in 2023 and 5.6% in 2024.

Sub-Saharan Africa’s GDP growth rate will rise to 3.5% in 2023 and 3.9% in 2024 but World Bank warns governments against sinking deeper into debt, which accounted for “59.5% of GDP in 2022.” China was forced to waive debts for 17 African countries last year.

With many African currencies losing value against the US dollar in 2022, save for Zambia’s kwacha, low export capacity and sustained inflation will cause economic difficulties for the continent in 2023.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ world-bank-projects-impressivegrowth-142000000.html

Source: https://qz.com/ world-bank-projectsimpressive-growth-for-senegalin-20-1849968829

Greater Tortue Ahmeyim natural gas project offshore-energy.biz

Space-BasedSolarPowerHardwarewasJustLaunched into OrbitforTesting

By Edd Gent

SPACE-BASED SOLAR POWER could provide round-the-clock access to renewable energy, sidestepping one of the technology’s biggest limitations. Now the idea is going to get its first true test after a Falcon 9 rocket successfully launched experimental hardware designed to assess its feasibility.

The idea of stationing gigantic solar panels in orbit around Earth and beaming the power back has been around for decades. The possibility is attractive, because in space you’re no longer at the mercy of the weather or the planet’s cycles of day and night, and solar radiation levels are higher as sunlight has not had to pass through the atmosphere.

So far though, space-based solar power has remained in the realm of sci-fi due to the technical complexity and unforgiving economics of space technologies. But thanks to a $100 million donation in 2013, a multidisciplinary team from Caltech has been quietly working on it over the past decade, developing the various technologies required to make it a reality. And this past Tuesday (January 3), prototypes of some of the key subsystems required for a full-scale space-based solar power plant were delivered into orbit by SpaceX for testing.

Over the next few months, the team behind the Caltech Space Solar Power Project will test out the systems that will allow their flexible solar panels to unfurl in space and the technology designed to transmit power back to Earth. They will also assess how well different kinds of solar panel technologies hold up in the harsh environment of space.

“No matter what happens, this prototype is a major step forward,” Ali Hajimiri, one of the three Caltech professors leading the project, said in a statement. “It works here on Earth, and has passed the rigorous steps required of anything

launched into space. There are still many risks, but having gone through the whole process has taught us valuable lessons.”

Building solar panels in space is a much more complicated business than doing so on Earth. The biggest challenge is getting them there in the first place, which is limited by the incredible cost of launching material into orbit. As a result, the team has had to focus on reducing the weight of their solar panels as much as possible without sacrificing their generating capacity

Their solution combines ultra-thin flexible solar panels, an ingenious design that integrates power generation and transmission, and a novel modular architecture that makes it possible to combine many smaller, self-contained panels to create large arrays.

The basic unit of their design is a rectangular tile a few inches across whose surface is covered in mirror-like solar concentrators that direct sunlight to a strip of photovoltaic cells, where it’s converted into electricity. Beneath the surface is an integrated circuit that converts the power from the solar cells into microwaves, which are then transmitted out of the bottom of the tile by an array of ultra-thin and flexible patch antennas.

This design generates significant weight savings, because it removes the need for bulky wiring to transport the generated electricity to a central transmitter. These tiles will then be arranged into strips and integrated into a novel folding structure that will be compact at launch and then unfurl once in space.

The result will be a self-contained spacecraft that is able to deploy itself, generate power, and transmit it back to Earth, but the vision involves combining many of these to create arrays able to produce comparable amounts of energy to a land-

based system. That setup makes it easy to adjust the size and configuration of arrays, and also means that damage to individual modules won’t put the entire system out of action.

The experiments launched this week are designed to test several of the key underlying technologies behind this architecture. One called DOLCE (Deployable on-Orbit ultraLight Composite Experiment) will test out the unfurling mechanism by deploying a six-by-six-foot frame from a small trash-bin-sized canister

Another called MAPLE (Microwave Array for Power-transfer Low-orbit Experiment) will test out an array of ultralight microwave transmitters designed to beam power over a distance in space. A final experiment called ALBA will put 32 different types of photovoltaic cells through their paces over several months to see which operates most effectively in the punishing environment of space.

Assuming all of the tests go according to plan, the researchers will have validated some of the key technologies required to make their vision a reality. But given the dropping price of solar power on Earth and the growing prevalence of energy storage technologies designed to deal with solar power’s intermittency, there are question marks over the economics and practicality of the idea.

The technology could play an important role in the longer run, though, John Timmer writes in Ars Technica. Most estimates suggest that we should be able to switch around 70 percent of our grid to renewable energy fairly easily, but the lack of reliability due to seasonal changes or rare weather

events mean that going higher could be tough. A source of renewable energy that’s available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week could help to plug the gap when conditions on Earth lead to a drop in generation. We are likely still decades away from needing that, but given how complex space-based solar power is, getting to work on the technology now seems like a smart bet.

https://singularityhub.com/2023/01/06/hardware-totest-space-based-solar-power-was-just-launched-intoorbit

Image credit: Caltech

Africa Will Get a New $1 Billion Spaceport in Djibouti

By Nest - bird's virtual newsroom

AFRICA COULD SOON get a new spaceport

after Djibouti signed a partnership deal with Hong Kong Aerospace Technology to build a facility to launch satellites and rockets in the northern Obock region

According to the preliminary deal, the Djibouti government will “provide the necessary land (minimum 10 sq km and with a term of not less than 35 years) and all the necessary assistance to build and operate the Djiboutian Spaceport.”

The $1 billion spaceport project will also involve the construction of a port facility, a power grid and a highway to ensure the reliable transportation of aerospace materials.

The deal’s signing was presided over by the president of Djibouti, Ismail Omar Guelleh, and the project is set to be completed in the next five years.

The spaceport is a massive milestone for Africa, making it the first orbital spaceport on African soil.

The Djibouti Spaceport Project

The preliminary deal, signed in partnership with Touchroad International Holdings Group, clears the path for a formal contract signing, planned for March 2023.

A statement by Hong Kong Aerospace Technology notes, “the project would enable the Group to leverage on the resources of the Republic of Djibouti and the business connection of Touchroad in Africa, and allow the Group a smooth entrance into the aerospace business in the Republic of Djibouti.”

According to Victor Mwongera, Head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Kenyatta University, the projection will avail a launch base that will serve all Africans.

“It will push eastern Africa off the sleeping state as far as active development of space-based innovations are concerned,” he explained.

Trial and small-scale launches have been executed in Africa in the past, including the Italianoperated Broglio Space Centre (San Marco) in Malindi, Kenya and Algeria’s Reggane

Mwongera sees the expansion of Africa’s space industry—with a number of African countries already building and operating their own microsatellites—as a growing trend.

“It has taken time but we needed time as a continent to be ready for this age. Now that we are ready, you are seeing the number is increasing and it is bound to increase further,” he said.

“In any technology, it is not possible for you to come in and be a leader instantly, but today in Africa, there are many young minds interested in the field, it’s all promising,” he added.

Africa’s Space Industry is a Billion Dollar Sector

According to the 2022 annual sector report of research firm Space in Africa, the value of the African space and satellite industry has risen to more than $19.6 billion.

The charge is fuelled by 14 countries that have launched 52 satellites into space.

South Africa, Egypt, Algeria, and Nigeria have the highest number of satellites in space as of 2022, each having launched more than five satellites.

Mwongera explained that east African countries are well positioned to harbor more spaceports, due to their proximity to the equator.

“At the equator... there is minimal energy required,” he said.

To leverage Kenya’s potential, Viwanda Africa Group, in collaboration with Longshot Space Technology, has commissioned a team of students from Kenyatta and Nairobi universities to undertake a viability study on the ideal location to establish a spaceport in Kenya.

Led by Mwongera, the team identified Marsabit County to be ideal.

“We are currently in progress with a feasibility study of the location before we go into the next phase,” Mwongera said.

The original version of this article was published by bird-Africa no filter https://finance.yahoo.com/news/africa-1-billionspaceport-djibouti-070000536.html

More: https://chinesestories.net/its-amazing-thatchinas-first-overseas-space-launch-site-will-beestablished-in-this-country/

Image credit: chinesestories.net

Marsabit County, Kenya (in red)

Republic of Djibouti

Africa Data Centres Breaks Ground on New Sameer Facility in Nairobi

By Masahudu Ankiilu

Data Center

AFRICA DATA CENTRES (ADC) has broken ground on its new facility in Nairobi to expand its existing data centre by up to 15MW of IT load in the East African country.

The facility will be built in the company’s leadingedge modular design.

Africa Data Centres, a business of Cassava Technologies, a pan-African technology group announced that it has officially broken ground on

an additional data centre facility in Nairobi. The new build will see the existing facility on the adjacent piece of land expanded up to an extra 15MW of IT load.

ADC’s expansion at the new site will be completed in the first half of 2024 and will bring five times more capacity than is currently installed.

“We believe that data centres will play a significant role in digital transformation and economic growth

on our continent. Without them, the push towards a digital economy in Africa will be missing a key pillar.

Our decision to increase our investment in our data centres in Kenya is in recognition of the position the country now occupies as a leader in the adoption of digital technologies in Africa” Hardy Pemhiwa, Group President & CEO of Cassava Technologies said.

During the ground-breaking ceremony today, Tesh Durvasula, CEO of Africa Data Centres, said, “The expansion will enable Africa Data Centre clients to grow and scale depending on their requirements.

They can start small, increase to a medium capacity, and even benefit from a hyperscale type of deployment in a few years if they choose to. This will enable customers to operate multiple deployments across our sites with a single operations team, campus, and infrastructure they are familiar with”.

Kenya is the country that pioneered mobile money, and today boasts of a wide range of incubators and tech startups, a clear sign of an innovative tech culture. The focus on Kenya as a key region aims to take the region further into the digital era and uplift the country’s profile globally as an attractive investment destination for international cloud providers, hyperscalers, and other ICT companies.

The new data facility will begin with 5MW of IT load and will be built in Africa Data Centres’ leading-edge modular design – an innovative approach that sees the entire facility, including all critical plant rooms, prefabricated off-site. This ensures the highest possible quality, whilst

local contractors will still benefit from contracts to lay foundations, assemble, and complete the build.

He stresses that sustainability is at the heart of everything Africa Data Centres does. In terms of cooling, even as the largest network of interconnected, carrier- and cloud-neutral data centre facilities on the continent, ADC has a strict policy of not using adiabatic systems. “We do not use water in any of our cooling systems and are one of the few colocation providers who have taken this step,” said Durvasula.

While the common belief might be that water and adiabatic systems are more efficient than air cooling systems, this simply is not the case. “With the newest technology, if free-cooling capacity is maximised, it becomes far more efficient and saves water which is becoming a critical commodity, particularly in Africa.”

He added that Africa Data Centre is fortunate in Kenya as almost 70% of grid power is from green energy sources. “This helps us to meet our sustainability objectives because we understand no organisation can achieve zero carbon emissions by itself.

We understand that sustainability is about ensuring that we conduct ourselves in a manner that minimises our impact on the environment. We extend this ethos to all of our partners, and constantly look for ways to ensure that all elements of the business contribute positively to the sustainability of the planet”.

Today‘s event is a step forward in the company’s expansion plans announced in 2021, which will see Africa Data Centres investing $500m into building hyperscale data centres across Africa with the support of the US Development Finance Corporation..

https://africaneyereport.com/africa-data-centresbreaks-ground-on-new-sameer-facility-in-nairobi/ Image credit: africaneyereport.com, datacenterdynamics.com

Groundbreaking

UNCLE NEAREST PREMIUM WHISKEY , the top-selling Black-owned spirits brand in the world, announced the launch of its HBCU Old Fashioned Challenge, a nationwide initiative to raise $1 million dollars for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs).

Uncle Nearest Launches for Underfunded Historic Universities

By Shanique Yates

Kicked off on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, and extending through Black History Month and Women’s History Month in February and March, respectively, the program will raise money to be distributed amongst the country’s top 58 ranked HBCUs to use as they see fit, according to a press release.

Through the HBCU Old Fashioned Challenge, Uncle Nearest not only aims to raise money for these institutions, but to shine a light on their contributions to workforce diversity and the role they play in economic mobility. HBCUs make up less than 3% of college institutions, but they enroll 10% of all African American students, and produce almost 20% of all African American graduates. These graduates have gone on to hold high income jobs, making up 40% of Black judges, 50% of Black doctors and lawyers, and 40% of Black engineers. Underfunding of HBCUs leads to lower graduation rates due to student debt and lack of resources, as well as causes understaffing and underrepresentation of Black faculty members.

“Many have opinions about Deion Sanders‘ decision to move from Jackson State, an HBCU, to Colorado. I will tell you what I know to be true: Coach Prime put a much-needed spotlight on how HBCU programs can compete if they are properly funded,” said Fawn Weaver, founder and CEO of Uncle Nearest. “He showed us what one person

(top) Fawn Weaver, founder and CEO of Uncle Nearest Courtesy via PR Newswire)

(lower) Uncle Nearest Premium Whiskey and Uncle Nearest Old Fashions Courtesy via PR Newswire)

Initiative to Raise $1M cally Black Colleges and

with influence, shining a light on HBCUs, can do to help. Enrollment in HBCUs grew tremendously after Beyonce’s 2019 film, Homecoming. I am certainly no Beyonce, but I have a spotlight on me, and it’s my greatest honor to be able to shift that spotlight where it should be – on our incredible Historically Black Colleges and Universities. When I reached out to share this program, so many of them asked me, ‘What can we do to help?’ I told each of them that I didn’t want them to do anything. It’s our turn to be torchbearers and give back, asking nothing in return.”

The launch date of the Uncle Nearest Old Fashioned Challenge on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, was strategically chosen to spotlight the legacy of HBCUs in the life of one of our greatest American leaders. At the age of 15, following in the footsteps of his father Martin Luther King, Sr., MLK Jr. enrolled at Morehouse College, a historically Black, men’s liberal arts college in Atlanta, Georgia. Both MLK Jr. and Sr. received their undergraduate degrees from Morehouse. The Uncle Nearest Old Fashioned Challenge extends through Women’s History Month as an homage to Spelman College, a historically Black women’s college and the number one ranked HBCU in America.

How to Support the Campaign

From January 16 to March 31, 2023, consumers will be able to participate in the challenge in one of four ways:

»For every Uncle Nearest Old Fashioned sold at participating bars and restaurants, one dollar will be donated to the challenge.

»Uncle Nearest will donate one dollar for each bottle of whiskey sold at participating online and brick-and-mortar retail stores.

»ReserveBar will sell Old Fashioned Cocktail Kits, featuring a bottle of Uncle Nearest as well as syrup and bitters from Hella Cocktail Co., the Black-owned bitters and soda company. For every kit sold, both Uncle Nearest and ReserveBar will donate one dollar to the challenge.

»During the time period, brand fans can also submit a photo of a homemade Uncle Nearest Old Fashioned at www.oldfashionedcocktail. com. Uncle Nearest will donate one dollar for each image received.

“As a proud Morehouse Man and member of Pi Chapter of Kappa Alpha Psi, I’m honored and grateful to work for a company where I didn’t need to go to the leader and say HBCUs need our help,” said W. Jay Madison, IV, Director of Legacy and Strategic Partnerships for Uncle Nearest. “Fawn came to me and said, ‘We have to do something.’ Every one of my team members immediately embraced the mission of this initiative, and our distributors, retail stores and outlets, restaurant, hotel, and bar partners came on board. One million dollars is just the beginning. We expect to see this program get bigger and even better every year, and our hope is other corporations will join with their own initiatives to support HBCUs.”

For more information on the HBCU Old Fashioned Challenge, including a list of participating bars, restaurants, and retailers, and to follow along on the road to $1 million raised, please visit www. oldfashionedcocktail.com.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/uncle-nearestlaunches-initiative-to-raise-1m-for-underfundedhistorically-blackcolleges-anduniversities/

Sierra Leone Passes Landmark Law on Women's Rights

By Cecilia Macaulay - BBC News

SIERRA LEONE HAS PASSED what has been described as a "ground-breaking" law to improve women's rights.

President Julius Maada Bio made an apology to women for their poor treatment in the past: "For so long we haven't been fair to you," he said.

The law states that 30% of public and private jobs must be reserved for women

The Minister of Gender and Children's Affairs says women have been "crying" out "for years" for this change.

"It means a lot to women in Sierra Leone," Manty Tarawalli told the BBC's Newsday radio programme, adding that no other sub-Saharan African country had passed such a law.

The law lets girls who are still at school know "there are opportunities for them in Sierra Leone for employment for business" and for them to contribute to the economy, Ms Tarawalli said.

Under the new Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment Act (GEWE), women also benefit from ringfenced senior positions in the workplace, at least 14-weeks of maternity leave, equal access to bank credit and training opportunities.

There are harsh repercussions for employers who do not stick to the new gender ratios, including hefty fines of £2,000 ($2,500), and even potential prison time for institutions like banks that do not give women fair access to financial support. It is thought this will make it easier for women to start their own businesses.

The government says the employment law will apply to any business with more than 25 employees, but a final decision has not yet been made.

Ms Tarawalli said the move was "important" but that "more steps will have to be taken before the country can say fairness has been achieved across the genders".

Discrimination against women in the workplace is a "big issue," according to the minister, and the new law will "change the status quo," she said.

For Sierra Leone to become a middle-income country it must engage the 52% of the population who are women in the economy, Ms Tarawalli added.

Prior to the law, the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency (UNFPA) said that "progress has been made in expanding opportunities for women and girls" but warned that "gender inequality and denial of women's rights are still prevalent at all levels in Sierra Leonean society".

As for gender equality in the continent as a whole, UN Women also says that progress has been made, but "the majority of women work in insecure, poorly paid jobs, with few opportunities for advancement".

https://news.yahoo.com/sierra-leone-passes-

Ms. Manty Tarawalli, Minister of Gender and Children's Affairs africanchildforum.org

EXECUTIVE-LED TRADE MISSION TO AFRICA

STOPS IN: SOUTH AFRICA| GHANA| NIGERIA

Discover New Business Opportunities in South Africa, Ghana and Nigeria!

As part of its Global Diversity Export Initiative (GDEI), the U.S. Department of Commerce invites you to apply for a business development trade mission to Africa August 6-15, 2023. Mission participants will travel to South Africa, Ghana, and an optional stop in Nigeria.

Designed to create commercial connections between U.S. sellers from underserved communities and African buyers and distributors, this mission is an ideal opportunity for U.S. companies in the automotive, ICT, safety & security, and consumer goods (i.e. haircare, cosmetics, toiletries, etc.) industries seeking to enter or expand their presence in these key markets on the African continent.

Why Join This Trade Mission?

By participating in this executive-led trade mission, your company can leverage the federal government’s credibility and contacts and enhance your ability to secure meetings and gain greater exposure in Africa. Participants will: Experience three African marketsfor U.S. goods & services in person and up close

Gain market insights from in-country trade experts

Make personal industry contacts

Meet potential buyers and partners

Solidify business strategies

Advance specific projects.

GDEIisaninitiativeoftheDepartmentofCommerce’sInternational TradeAdministration-U.S.CommercialServiceandtargetsminority, women,LGBTQ+,veteran,anddisabled-ownedcompanieswith programsthatassistwithinternationaltradesupport.

Learn More & Apply

Scanthecode,orvisit: trade.gov/global-diversityexport-initiative-mission-africa

Date: August 6-15, 2023

Stops: South Africa, Ghana, and optional stop in Nigeria

Target Industry Sectors: Automotive, ConsumerGood, ICT, Safety & Security

Cost:

SME*/Trade Associations

$3,725 South Africa and Ghanaonly

$5,720 South Africa, Ghana & Nigeria**

Large Company

$6,520 South Africa and Ghana only

$10,300 South Africa, Ghana & Nigeria

Additional Company Participants

$800 SMEs/ $1300 Large Company (Limit 2 participants per company)

*SMEdeterminedbySBAguidelines

**Grantsmaybeavailable

Contact Us

Eve.Lerman@trade.gov

Dusan.Marinkovic@trade.gov

Sponsorship Opportunities Available

Nathalie.Jeudy@trade.gov

Fernando.Bentz@trade.gov

Regenerative Farming Links Soil Health to Human Health

By Clarisa Diaz

BOB JONES IS THE THIRD GENERATION in his family to run Chef’s Garden, a 300-acre farm in Ohio that has used regenerative agriculture methods for the last 10 years.

“Our belief is that modern agriculture in the United States is broken, both economically and agronomically,” said Jones. The model for decades has been to go to the bank and borrow operating capital with the hope that it can all be paid back, a cycle of debt that makes it difficult for farms to be financially sustainable. “That’s how we’ve gotten to a tremendously shrinking number of farms in the United States,” said Jones.

To combat that, the Jones family decided to veer away from the conventional farming model. Instead, they invested in regenerative methods like rotating fields in thirds: land for crops to be harvested, land to be filled with cover crops, and land to be left alone. The result is soil that has time to recover, regain microbes that keep the soil healthy, and grow higher quality produce that has gained a reputation. (The farm now provides produce for Michelin Star restaurants across the country.)

Farmers at the Chef’s Garden are also experimenting with new methods to scale up their operations while maintaining the fields. “To see these guys doing regenerative practices on a major scale was shocking,” said Dr. Nasha Winters, a naturopathic doctor who recently toured Chef’s Garden. “They took us through all these growing environments, from microgreens to various indoor and outdoor crops, different temperature greenhouses and lighting processes—how technology is meeting traditional old farming practices was cool to see.”

At the end of the tour, Winters watched produce being packaged for shipment. She was in awe as she saw recipients that included top chefs at places like the Four Seasons and the Ritz-Carlton. “You’re recognizing that people are willing to pay top

dollar and that this can compete with conventional farming,” said Winters. “But they also allow a more cost-affordable approach to eating really healthy.”

Connecting soil to human health

For decades, farmers have leaned on chemical fertilizers and pesticides to yield larger amounts of monocrops. The more robust harvests help farmers pay back start-up loans and turn profits. But decades of chemicals have ruined soils, making them less capable of providing nourishment for the crops, and lessening their nutritional value as a result.

They also can have adverse affects on humans. Winters is an expert in metabolic oncology, metabolic health, and terrain health. Diagnosed with cancer at 19, Winters was baffled as to how she, a young person in rural Kansas, could be struck with such a disease. She believes her exposure to big farms using pesticides contributed to her diagnosis.

Now in her fifties, Winters advocates for holistic health practices. “You have to go out of your way to seek out and ingest healthy food today,” she said. “To tell the average American or anybody in a western developed country to eat healthy, that leaves a ton of room for interpretation.”

When trying to eat healthy, we often tend to look at the produce itself, but the quality of the soil in which it was grown is more indicative of a plant’s nutritional value.

More medical professionals are seeing food as medicine. Physicians and nurses at the healthcare company Geisinger, for example, recently created the Fresh Food Farmacy, which focuses on providing healthy meals for clients in need.

“Folks in the medical community are reaching out to the agricultural community,” said Jones. The United States has the lowest per capita spending on food of any industrialized nation in the world. Conversely, the US also has the highest per capita

spending on healthcare of any industrialized nation in the world.

“We believe there’s a direct link between those two statistics,” said Jones.

Collaboration between farmers and doctors

Transitioning a conventional farm to a regenerative one requires an initial investment and about three years of development, but the long-

term benefits are real. Regenerative farms produce more sustainable harvest and higher profits. Jones estimates the profits of Chef’s Garden have grown by 30% over the last 10 years.

“We have to accept responsibility as farmers and do what we can to manage nutrients on the farm and keep it on the farm,” said Jones. The knowhow of managing Chef’s Garden has been years

see page 44

Some of the regenerative farms in Africa

Source: Regenerative Farm Map, Regeneration International

Regenerative Farming

from page 43

in the making: figuring out how to create a multispecies cover crop effect, plowing in the biomass back into the soil, no-till plantings where possible, and using straw mulch instead of plastic mulch. “And we’re still learning,” he says.

The joint goals of Jones and Winters drove them to plan a future collaboration, turning a dormant 1,200-acre golf course in Arizona into a regenerative farm, wellness center, and 80-bed hospital.

“Every single living plant on that property is going to have some edible or medicinal quality so that people can literally go out between their hospital

treatments and graze right there,” explained Winters. “The patients will be on the farm with the farmers, and the farmers will be in the kitchen with the chefs, and everyone will be cross-pollinating everywhere.”

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/regenerativefarming-links-soil-health-165700871.html

Source: https://qz.com/regenerative-farminglinks-soil-health-to-human-health-1850000830

Image credit: European Molecular Biology Organization

FACT SHEET: Cancer Moonshot Announces New Actions Aimed to Reduce the Cancer Burden in Africa as Part of the 2022 U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit

Source for detailed report: whitehouse.gov

WHEN U.S. PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN and Dr. Jill Biden reignited the Cancer Moonshot in February, they set ambitious, achievable goals: to reduce the death rate from cancer by at least 50% over the next 25 years, and improve the experience of people and families living with and surviving cancer, ultimately ending cancer as we know it today. They called for everyone to do their par t including federal agencies and departments, private companies, health care providers, patient groups, philanthropies, and more.

While the immediate goals are domestic, the ambitions of the Cancer Moonshot extend far beyond the borders of the United States, especially as the burden of cancer falls heavily to lowerand middle-income countries (LMICs), where 80% of global cancer deaths occur. International work as part of the Cancer Moonshot is focused on equity and collaboration, thereby increasing access to prevention, screening, treatment, and care for everyone facing a cancer diagnosis and their families around the world.

Background:

For decades, the United States has partnered with African nations to meet shared health challenges, working together to invest billions of dollars and saving countless lives. However, despite much progress, non-communicable diseases (NCDS) like cancer are now estimated to lead all causes of death across the African continent. A new Lancet Oncology commission for sub-Saharan Africa estimates more than one million cancer deaths will occur per year in those countries by 2040. There are actions we can take to prevent this outcome. For example, cervical cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths in sub-Saharan

Africa. With preventative vaccines for Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) for girls and boys along with screening and early detection for cervical cancer, especially in women living with HIV who have up to a 6-fold higher risk of developing cervical cancer, we can change the direction and end cancer in countries in Africa as we know it. This and other work build on broadly adopted global goals to decrease the impact of cancer, with a focus on delivering better outcomes for childhood cancers, eliminating cervical cancer, decreasing the devastating impact of breast cancer, and to expand cancer prevention and early detection.

New Actions as Part of U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit

As part of the President’s U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit, the First Lady convened a conversation with the spouses of African leaders on “Breaking Down Barriers to Cancer Care for Young Women and Girls”, led by Ambassador John Nkengasong, Coordinator of the United States President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). In addition, leaders across U.S. departments and agencies and the private sector have demonstrated unwavering commitment to improve cancer outcomes in countries in Africa through a number of new announcements and commitments. These efforts include strengthening domestic public health infrastructure, building resilient health systems, investing in health workers (see more here), as well as funding for robust and impactful initiatives across the African continent on cancer prevention, screening, treatment, and research, totaling approximately $200 million.

These new efforts from agencies and departments include:

• support for the design and implementation of new, pragmatic technological interventions, clinical trial development, research centers, and the strengthening of institutional capacity for global cancer research in countries in Africa, by the National Cancer Institute (NCI);

• funding for high-risk and high-gain cancer research projects, filling existing research gaps related to prostate cancer, by the Department of Defense Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs (CDMRP);

• investments from the State Department and the U.S. Department of Energy to support the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Rays of Hope initiative to expand access to life-saving cancer radiotherapy treatments in countries in Africa;

• continued efforts from the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to integrate cervical cancer screening and treatment of pre-cancer as routine care for HIV-positive women under the Go Further Initiative, a collaboration with the George W. Bush Institute, and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

These actions are just a few examples of support from the United States to decrease the burden of cancer in countries in Africa.

The private sector has also stepped up, responding with approximately $130 million in new announcements. This includes:

• capacity strengthening and support for over 100 cancer centers across the African continent;

• providing access to medications with an investment of approximately $50 million impacting about 20,000 children and adolescents over a 5-year period, while alleviating medicine shortages through collaboration;

• improving health care professionals’ knowledge and skills in cancer care and prevention;

• procurement of linear accelerators to provide access to cancer care in some countries for the first time;

• building genomic registries to accelerate cancer research to uncover precision drug and diagnostic targets that will be effective in more diverse populations; and

• initiatives to help achieve the World Health Organization (WHO) targets to eliminate cervical cancer by 2030.

• To add your story, ideas, or new actions and collaborations domestically or globally, engage with us at: whitehouse.gov/cancermoonshot

Renewed Commitments from the United States to Combat Cancer

Across the Continent of Africa:

• Department of Defense Funds Prostate Cancer Research in Countries in Africa

• National Cancer Institute Commits to:

• Supporting New Cancer Technologies across Africa

• Support for Cancer Implementation Science in Countries in Africa

• HIV/Cervical Cancer Prevention Clinical Trials Network (CASCADE) to Tackle Cervical Cancer Burden in Africa

• HIV- and AIDS -Associated Malignancy Research in Countries in Africa to Address the Increased Burden of HIV- and AIDSAssociated Cancers

• Strengthen Institutional Capacity for Global Cancer Research in Countries in Africa

• State Department and Department of Energy Announce $4 Million in Funding to Build New Capacities to Detect and Treat Cancer in Countries in Africa

• U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief to Provide Access to Cervical Cancer Prevention, Detection and Treatment for HIVPositive Women in Countries in Africa

Private Sector Response to Improving see page 48

Cancer Moonshot from page 47

Cancer Outcomes in Countries in Africa:

• Improving Access to Cancer Screening and Prevention

• AstraZeneca extends its Accelerate Change Together for Cancer Care program to sustainably improve cancer care ecosystems across the African continent.

• BD announces support for Kenya to achieve cervical cancer elimination by 2030. BD (Becton, Dickinson and Company) and the Ministry of Health Kenya will soon launch a pilot-for-scale oncology partnership aimed at providing end-to-end cervical cancer screening within the public sector.

• Botswana-Rutgers Partnership for Health pilots a rapid “screen and treat” program for breast cancer to close the breast cancer screening gap in Botswana.

• Elekta Foundation launches a new model in cervical cancer prevention and treatment, that can be scalable in Rwanda.

• Revitalash Cosmetics and City of Hope’s Ethiopia Breast Cancer Initiative announce support for breast cancer detection, diagnosis and treatment for the women of Ethiopia.

• The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center announces a formal agreement with the WHO to establish a new international collaboration to reduce the global burden of women’s cancers.

• Increasing Capacity for Cancer Research, Infrastructure, and Training

• Allied Against Cancer implements the ChemoSafe program to protect oncology workers who handle hazardous chemotherapies.

• Amazon Web Services commits resources to reduce health disparities and promote health equity across the African continent.

• Amazon Web Services (AWS) as part of its global $40 million Health Equity Initiative will bridge the gaps in cancer care outcomes in underserved regions.

• AstraZeneca will establish a new liver cancer research partnership in countries in Africa to accelerate improved understanding and care for a form of liver cancer.

• Project ECHO partners with leaders across the African continent to establish at least 30 new programs to improve cancer care.

• Uganda Cancer Institute-Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center launches “Cancer Genomics and Genomic Data Science for East Africa,” and additional programs to train East African researchers in cancer genomics and foster future researchers.

• Yemaachi will identify novel targets to diagnose and treat cancer and will provide diagnostic services to children and adults with cancer across the continent of Africa.

• BIO Ventures for Global Health commits to forging five new African-led research projects.

• Moffitt Cancer Center together with University of Ghana work to strengthen and expand capacity to conduct cancer research in Ghana.

• Northwestern University West Africa-U.S. Cancer Prevention and Control Initiative invests to build sustainable research and capacity for African scientists.

• Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center and Fox Chase Cancer Center launch a cancer genomics study to characterize novel genetic, molecular, and social determinants of cancer across populations of African ancestry.

• Building Cancer Care Workforce and Delivery in Countries in Africa

• Bayer partners with the Egyptian Ministry of Health and Population as part of the “100 Million Healthy Lives” Presidential Initiative

to support access to liver cancer screening, diagnosis and treatment.

• BIO Ventures for Global Health will train an additional 5,000 African healthcare professionals in the management of cancer patients.

• Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Partners

In Health have teamed up with the Rwandan Ministry of Health and University of Pennsylvania to expand access to lifesaving cancer treatment.

• Global Health Catalyst to establish a U.S.Africa Center of Excellence in Cancer Care, Research, and Education in Tanzania with an initial commitment of over $5 million in funding.

• Roche and Jhpiego, a global health nonprofit and John Hopkins University affiliate, support implementation of sustainable cervical and breast cancer programs. Roche and Jhpiego team up to help prevent or reduce the morbidity and mortality of women facing breast or cervical cancer in countries in Africa, taking a woman-centered approach.

• Botswana-Rutgers Partnership for Health debuts the Kitso Oncology Workforce Training Program.

• Varian, a Siemens Healthineers Company, provides increased access to care by supporting the establishment of two new comprehensive cancer centers in Nigeria.

• Advancing Support, Research and Treatment Access for Pediatric Cancer Patients

• St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital is investing $200 million in the Global Platform for Access to Childhood Cancer Medicines.

• Texas Children’s Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine launched Global HOPE (Hematology-Oncology Pediatric Excellence) to improve the diagnosis and treatment of children with cancer and blood diseases.

• American Childhood Cancer Organization provides financial support to identify barriers to accessing childhood cancer essential medicines in East Africa.

• Global Pediatric Brain Tumor Network implements a new initiative which aims to

create an equitable ecosystem of care for pediatric brain cancer patients.

• Making Cancer Treatments Accessible:

• Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS) through the “Innovative Cancer Medicines” initiative that includes Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, the Clinton Health Access Initiative, and other partners, commits to demonstration projects in sub-Saharan Africa where patients will be enrolled and local stakeholders in each country will select the respective indications based on local population needs.

• Pfizer has committed to providing all of its current and future patented medicines and vaccines, available in the United States or European Union on a not-for-profit basis to government-funded public channels in Accord countries.

• Cures Within Reach expands its capacity building for clinical trials in countries in Africa.

• BIO Ventures for Global Health expands access to U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved cancer drugs to treat an additional 10,000 African cancer patients over the next three years.

• The Cancer Access Partnership (CAP) from Allied Against Cancer will offer 30 high-quality medicines at access prices to 25 countries in Africa starting in early 2023.

• Allied Against Cancer will implement 55 National Comprehensive Cancer Network Harmonized Guidelines for Sub-Sharan Africa by early 2023.

• Increasing Cancer Awareness and Education to Empower People

• BIO Ventures for Global Health, in collaboration with its partners, launches nationwide awareness campaigns targeting cancer patients and their caregivers.

• Allied Against Cancer announce the Treat the Pain program that will train more than 5,000 health workers in Africa to safely use opioids to treat cancer patients in pain.

Image credit: thehabarinetwork.com, registrypartners.com

Color Of Change Launches #CareForBlackHair Campaign to Remove Toxic Hair Products from Major Retailers

By Kay Wicker

WHEN A REPORT by the National Institutes of Health that found correlations between permanent hair treatments such as hair dyes and hair straighteners and an increased risk for hormonal cancers — including ovarian, breast, and uterine — in Black women was released in October, it made headlines and waves on social media. Now, it’s fueling a new campaign.

Color Of Change, the nation’s largest online racial justice organization, has launched a new campaign, #CareForBlackHair, to hold retailers selling these toxic products and the brands creating them accountable. The campaign calls for retailers to pull harmful haircare products from their shelves and for brands to change their formulations to nontoxic ingredients

In an interview with theGrio, Color Of Change Vice President Jade Magnus Ogunnaike called the findings of the National Institutes of Health study “absolutely shocking.” She also said that while the harmfulness of hair dye is a major issue, the risk posed by hair straightening products really moved Color Of Change to take action.

“Hair relaxers are a product that’s directly related to Black women. Black women are the people who hair relaxers are marketed to. We are, I would imagine, some of the largest consumers of it. Any hair relaxer box that you see is going to have a Black woman on it. So as the largest racial justice organization, we saw a really important avenue for us to step in and talk to retailers and ask them to remove these products from their shelves,” said Ogunnaike.

#CareForBlackHair was launched in December 2022, though Color Of Change began reaching out to retailers in early November. Ogunnaike said she could not go into detail about all the retailers

Color Of Change has approached; however, she did share that her organization recently had a disheartening conversation with supermarket retailer Giant Food.

Uterine cancer increasing among Black women, and is more deadly than in white women

“They said that they would not be removing the relaxers, and then they pointed us to a statement from a lobbying group that represents personal care products,” she said.

The statement from the lobbying group Personal Care Products Council, released in October in direct response to the study, said the “association” of these products with an increased risk of uterine cancer is not the same as the “causation” of the risk and that the study doesn’t consider other factors like age and lifestyle.

“That was obviously horrific for us to read, especially from a supermarket like Giant,” Ogunnaike said, adding, “It was horrific for us to read that information, specifically, because the letter came from a woman of color.”

Giant Food gave the following statement in response to an inquiry from theGrio:

“Giant Food continually reviews and assesses

our product assortment to ensure it meets our high consumer satisfaction and safety standards. The products in question, like all cosmetics, are regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act) and the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act (FPLA). We will remain up to date on any inquiries on these products, but they continue to be deemed safe by these high regulatory standards.”

Ogunnaike said her interactions with Giant Food illustrate a specific challenge with retailers: They can hide behind lobby groups and ignore the science.

“This is a study that was done by the National Institutes of Health. It’s not some basement scientific lab,” she said. “This is a really official and well-regarded study. For Giant to dismiss Black women like that and to dismiss the risk of cancer like that was really, really disturbing.”

Frequent use of chemical hair straighteners and hair dyes linked to increased risk of cancer

Regardless, Ogunnaike and Color Of Change are pushing forward. The issue couldn’t be more timely, with major retailers making an increased

effort to market to Black people, especially with Black History Month just around the corner.

Ogunnaike said Color Of Change is asking for anyone interested to sign its petition and stay tuned for ways they can help make calls of action to retailers. In the future, Color Of Change is planning in-person events in the cities where these retailers are based.

Ogunnaike emphasized that Color Of Change isn’t against the practice of straightening one’s hair.

“We understand the complex decisions that Black women have to make around their hair, and we understand the relationship to their hair. We are totally agnostic to how Black women choose to style their hair,” Ogunnaike said. “What we are not agnostic about is corporations’ and retailers’ responsibility to consumers about the products that they are selling. It’s incredibly disturbing that in 2023, there is still such a negligent attitude toward Black women.”

https://thegrio.com/2023/01/19/color-of-changelaunches-care-for-black-hair-campaign

Image credit: Color of Change

Guinea Worm Eradication Effort Enters ‘Most Difficult’ Phase

By Alex Sanz

THE CARTER CENTER said Tuesday that only 13 human cases of Guinea worm disease were reported worldwide last year.

After decades of progress, the eradication program’s director cautioned the end phase of the global effort to eradicate the parasitic disease will be “the most difficult.”

The Atlanta-based center, founded by former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, Eleanor Rosalynn Carter, said the remaining infections occurred in four countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Six human cases were reported in Chad, five in South Sudan, one in Ethiopia and one in the Central African Republic, which remains under investigation.

That’s a significant drop from when former President Carter began leading the global eradication effort in 1986, when the disease infected 3.5 million people. The figures, which are provisional, are expected to be confirmed in the coming months.

“We are truly in the midst of that last mile and experiencing firsthand that it is going to be a very long and arduous last mile,” Adam Weiss, director of The Carter Center’s Guinea Worm Eradication Program, told The Associated Press. “Not so much as it taking more than the next seven years – five to seven years – but just knowing that it’s going to be a slow roll to get to zero.”

Guinea worm affects some of the world’s more vulnerable people and can be prevented by training people to filter and drink clean water.

People who drink unclean water can ingest parasites that can grow as long as 3 feet (1 meter). The worm incubates in people for up to a year

before painfully emerging, often through the feet or other sensitive parts of the body.

Weiss said the populations where Guinea worm still exists are prone to local insecurity, including conflict, which can prevent staff and volunteers from going house to house to implement interventions or offer support.

“If we take our foot off of the gas in terms of trying to accelerate getting to zero and providing support to those communities, there’s no question that you’re going to see a surge in Guinea worm,” Weiss said. “We’re continuing to make progress, even if it is not as fast as we all want it to be, but that progress continues.”

Guinea worm is poised to be the second human disease to be eradicated after smallpox, according to The Carter Center.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/health-news/ guinea-worm-eradication-effort-enters-mostdifficult-phase/ar-AA16HCOp?ocid=NL_ENUS_ A1_00010101_1_1&bep_ref=1&bep_csid=79870

Children in the town of Terekeka, South Sudan, draw water, Oct. 4, 2017, from a stagnant pond that was once infected with Guinea worm when the town was endemic.AP Photo/Mariah Quesada, File

Morgan State University Set to Become the First HBCU to Open a Medical School in 45 Years

By Shanique Yates

MORGAN STATE UNIVERSITY (MSU) is about to make history.

According to CBS News, the Maryland-based educational institution will become the first HBCU to open a new medical school in 45 years.

A Win For Maryland HBCUs

The year 2021 was a huge one for HBCUs in Maryland.

In fact, Coppin State University, Bowie State University, the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, and Morgan State University won a $577 million lawsuit against the state due to inadequate funding, per reports from The Washington Post.

The motion has been 15 years in the making.

The Partnership

Now, in partnership with Ascension Saint Agnes Hospital, MSU will launch a for-profit, private medical school.

They are aiming to open their doors in 2024.

“Let’s do this for Baltimore, let’s do this for our community,” said the Founding Dean of the proposed College of Osteopathic Medicine at MSU, Dr. John Sealey, according to CBS.

Addressing The Needs Of Others

Once established, the medical school will be home to 700 students and 150 employees. Through the establishment, the school hopes to give underserved minority students an opportunity to see all that the city of

Baltimore has to offer, while addressing the need for more physicians across the nation.

“There’s a shortage in the next 10 years, anywhere between 35,000 to 120,000 physicians in the United States of America,” Ascension St. Agnes Chief Medical O fficer, Jon D’Souza said, according to CBS. “We want to make sure we’re doing our part in training the next generation and we also want to make sure that the physicians we’re training are coming from the community they’re going to serve.”

According to D’Souza, students will receive training that cannot be found everywhere.

“It’s going to have a strong emphasis on population health,” he also said, CBS reports. “That means we don’t just fix a problem when it becomes a medical issue, we work within communities to prevent problems.

https://afrotech.com/morgan-state-to-open-firstnew-medical-school-at-an-hbcu-in-45-years

UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador

Gugu Mbatha-Raw calls for Urgent Support for Millions of Displaced Congolese

◄ UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Gugu MbathaRaw sits with Vicky and her family at a settlement site in Kalehe, South Kivu, the Democratic Republic of the Congo. © UNHCR/Caroline Irby

ACTOR AND GOODWILL AMBASSADOR for UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, Gugu MbathaRaw, is calling for urgent support for millions of displaced people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), following a visit to the region last week.

During her visit, Mbatha-Raw met with displaced individuals and families experiencing lifethreatening hardship, caused by the toxic mix of ongoing conflict, increased living costs, dwindling support from the international community, and the effects of climate change.

When visiting South Kivu, DRC, Mbatha-Raw met Vicky who explained that she is confronted daily with unbearable decisions, such as whether to prioritise food or medicine, whilst also being

unable to send all of her children to school. Vicky’s story is just one amongst millions in what is currently Africa’s largest displacement crisis.

“I’m extremely concerned,” said Mbatha-Raw. “Away from the headlines, millions of displaced people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo are struggling to survive. First, they were forced to flee unimaginable violence, and now, due to severe underfunding and shrinking life-saving assistance, they are forced to make impossible choices that no one should have to make. As the situation worsens women and girls are also at greater risk of violence. We cannot allow this to continue.”

As Mbatha-Raw departed from the DRC, UNHCR was repositioning resources in North Kivu to aid

thousands displaced by fresh clashes between armed groups and Congolese forces, including from a site that until this week had hosted more than 23,000 people already forced to flee violence.

Mbatha-Raw visited programmes by UNHCR and partners, which focus on providing shelter and essential items such as mats, blankets, jerry cans, and sanitary products for women. She also met internally displaced women and girls who were survivors of sexual violence to learn how medical and psycho-social support and livelihoods training were enabling them to rebuild their lives. Whilst witnessing the positive impact that can be made where limited funding is available, she also saw the desperate scale of the needs which cannot be met with current funding levels.

UNHCR recently launched a report showing that the funding for these lifesaving programmes in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and many other countries is not matching the growing needs. To date, only 42% of UNHCR’s requirements of US$225 million for the DRC this year is funded. If UNHCR does not receive additional funding before the end of the year (2022), it will be forced to make further cuts in lifesaving assistance, putting more lives in jeopardy.

In her role as UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador, Mbatha-Raw is calling on governments, the private sector and individuals to provide urgent funding to UNHCR to meet the most pressing needs of those displaced. Without such support, the situation will continue to deteriorate, and UNHCR fears that further cuts in assistance will be catastrophic.

She added: “In the Democratic Republic of Congo, as in many forgotten emergencies around the world, displaced families don’t have enough shelter, food or clean water to survive. In the same way that the world has shown solidarity and compassion to those displaced by other crises, including the war in Ukraine, we must now unite to support those in the DRC and other underfunded emergencies.”

https://www.unhcr.org/news/ announc/2022/11/63610ce54/unhcr-goodwillambassador-gugu-mbatha-raw-calls-urgent-supportmillions.html

Source (Quartz Video): https://qz.com/unambassador-gugu-mbatha-raw-on-working-withrefugees-1849979682

Image credit: qz.com, https://reporting.unhcr.org/ underfunded-report-2022

COP15 Adopts Biodiversity Plan to Protect 30% of Land and Water by 2030

By Mathieu Dion and Eric Roston

THE THREAT OF A MASS EXTINCTION of plant and animal species led 195 nations early Monday to agree to protect and restore at least 30% of the Earth’s land and water by 2030.

Wealthier nations committed to pay an estimated $30 billion a year by 2030 to poorer nations, in part through a new biodiversity fund that will be created under the Global Environment Facility, a 30-yearold organization that supports environmental work. The agreement was reached following two weeks of negotiations at the COP15 United Nations Biodiversity Conference in Montreal, where arguments over funding temporarily paused talks at one point.

“After four years of work, we have now reach[ed] the end of our journey,” said COP15’s president Huang Runqiu, adding the framework will guide countries to stop biodiversity loss.

Canada’s environment minister Steven Guilbeault, who was hosting the conference, compared the deal to the UN’s landmark Paris agreement, in which countries committed to keep

global temperature increase below 2 degrees Celsius and ideally closer to 1.5C.

“It is truly a moment that will mark history as Paris did for climate,” Guilbeault said to reporters on Monday.

The commitment over international flows is part of a broader move aimed to invest at least $200 billion annually. The bulk of that funding is assumed to come from countries’ domestic spending on nature protection — a flexible descriptor that might include funds for national parks or agriculture, philanthropy and private capital.

“There is no deal strong on ambition without money,” said Norway’s climate and environment minister, Espen Barth Eide, in an interview. “Neither is there a deal that is strong on money without ambition because the donors simply won’t pay without ambition. So, in a sense it’s a tradeoff.”

China, the second largest economy, has held the presidency of the talks since the previous round four years ago. Hundreds of individuals from investment

Tanzania President Lifts Six-year Ban on Political Rallies

By Nuzulack Dausen

TANZANIA'S PRESIDENTSamia Suluhu

Hassan lifted a ban on political rallies on Tuesday, January 3rd, six-and-a-half years after her predecessor John Magufuli imposed the measure which caused frequent run-ins between opposition leaders and police.

Under the policy, which came into force in 2016, elected politicians were allowed to conduct rallies in their constituencies but other political rallies or protests were banned.

"I am here to declare that the ban on political rallies has been lifted. It is the right of political parties to hold rallies but we all have responsibilities," Hassan told leaders of Tanzania's 19 registered political parties during a meeting at her office in the capital Dar es Salaam.

"Just inform us as the laws require. Security organs will evaluate your requests. If there is any threat, they won't allow you, but for the step we are in right now, they will definitely allow you to conduct your rallies."

Hassan, who came to office after Magufuli died in March 2021, said her decision to lift the ban was part of her strategy of Reconciliation, Resilience,

institutions, banks and businesses registered to attend the event, and played an unusually outsized but background role in the lead-up to COP15.

A hot debate over what businesses should disclose about their reliance on natural systems, and impacts on them, entered the last days of the talks. Negotiators agreed early on that countries should “ensure” their companies be transparent with regulators, investors and the public, but nations were divided over whether to make this requirement mandatory or not. The word “mandatory” was finally erased from the document.

Mandatory reporting was championed by France in pre-negotiations before the Montreal event. “An

Reforms and Rebuilding the nation, dubbed 4Rs.

She has lifted a ban on four newspapers and during a visit to Brussels last year she met Tundu Lissu, an exiled opposition leader.

Opposition parties and civil rights groups had criticised Magufuli's ban, which resulted in frequent arrests of political figures and clashes between their supporters and police.

Freeman Mbowe, the head of Tanzania's leading opposition party CHADEMA, was arrested in July 2021. He was charged with terrorism but prosecutors dropped the case in March 2022 and he met Hassan hours after his release.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/tanzaniapresident-lifts-six-year-ban-on-political-rallies/arAA15V2Ef

agreement with 196 parties implies compromises and things that we do not have completely,” said France’s minister for the ecology transition, Christophe Bechu. “What was essential [is] we have this base now.”

Countries have also agreed to fair and equitable benefit-sharing from the utilization of digital sequence information on genetic resources –which involves using genes in living organisms to create new products.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/ articles/2022-12-19/cop15-adopts-biodiversityplan-to-protect-30-of-land-and-water-by-2030

Image credit: UN Biodiversity

President Samia Suluhu Hassan FILE

PHOTO: COP26 in Glasgow © Thomson Reuters

Meta is Being Sued for $2 Billion for Exacerbating Ethiopia's Civil War

By Ananya Bhattacharya

A CASE FILED in Kenya’s High courts wants Meta to set up a $2 billion fund for victims of hate on Facebook, make changes to the platform’s algorithm, and hire more local-language moderators.

The social media giant has been accused of letting hateful and violent content flourish on the platform, fueling attacks during the two years of the conflict, dubbed Tigray War, which came to a truce in November.

The case has been filed by Ethiopian researchers Abrham Meareg and Amnesty International’s Fisseha Tekle, along with Kenyan human rights group Katiba Institute, and supported by legal nonprofit Foxglove, Bloomberg reports.

It’s far from the first time Facebook has been blasted for its role in the crisis that blew up in

late 2020. In 2019, Ethiopian running legend Haile Gebrselassie threatened to sue Facebook, blaming fake news shared on the platform for the violence that killed 78 people. A September 2020 Vice News investigation revealed Facebook as a hub of incendiary campaigns.

Person of interest: Abrham Meareg

Abrham Meareg is the son of Ethiopian academic Meareg Amare Abrha, who was followed home by armed men on motorbikes and shot dead on Nov. 3, 2021. Meareg claims his father, a chemistry professor who was a well-known member of the Tigray community, was killed after a spate of hate speech and disinformation attacking him spread on the platform. “If Facebook had just stopped the spread of hate and moderated posts properly, my father would still be alive,” Meareg told the BBC.

Meta can’t make peace with the Ethiopia conflict yet.

OPEC-Member Gabon Gets First Woman Vice President Ahead of Vote

By Ama Tanoh and Katarina Hoije

GABON’S PRESIDENTAli Bongo Ondimba appointed Rose Christiane Ossouka Raponda as the oil-rich central African nation’s first female vice president months before elections.

Ossouka Raponda, who became the country’s first woman Prime Minister in 2020, was named to the position that had been vacant since 2019. Her deputy, Alain-Claude Bilie-By-Nze, was promoted to Prime Minister. He had also served as Energy Minister in the previous cabinet.

Nicole Jeanine Lydie Roboty remains as Finance Minister and Vincent de Paul Massassa as Oil Minister in the revamped 45-member executive. Lee White was reappointed as Environment Minister.

The 2016 presidential vote was marred by a violent police crackdown as opposition supporters protested election results that few considered plausible, leaving scores of people dead. Bongo

Is Facebook making ethnic violence worse?

At 6.7 million, less than 6% of the Ethiopian population uses Facebook. Even then, Facebook maintains the country is a high-priority one.

In November 2021, shortly after removing prime minister Abiy Ahmed’s post inciting violence by asking people to “bury rebels,” Facebook’s parent company Meta said in a blogpost that it has been “implementing a comprehensive strategy to keep people in the country safe on our platform.”

Classifying all of Ethiopia as a “Temporary High Risk Location,” the company claims it has taken actions to moderate content, including: removing posts that violates its policies; improving its reporting and enforcement tools to include the four languages spoken and those central to the conflict (Amharic, Oromo, Somali, Tigrinya), including updating its list of ethnic slurs; working with

narrowly defeated his only challenger, Jean Ping, by less than 6,000 ballots.

Gabon is the second-smallest member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/ articles/2023-01-10/opec-member-gabon-gets-firstwoman-vice-president-ahead-of-vote

specialized international and local human rights and civil society organizations to report potentially violating content; and adding technology to identify hate speech in Amharic and Oromo before anyone reports it.

But critics aren’t convinced. Last year, whistleblower Frances Haugen, a former employee, told the US Senate the platform’s algorithm was “literally fanning ethnic violence” in countries like Ethiopia. Toxic content tends to fetch higher engagement.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/meta-being-sued2-billion-110700217.htm

Source: https://qz.com/meta-facebook-ethiopiahate-speech-violence-1849891712?utm_ medium=auto.techbriefing.us.wed. rd.20221214&utm_source=email&utm_ content=article&utm_campaign=email-2022 l

Rose Christiane Ossouka Raponda Photographer: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/Bloomberg

Biden Invites AU to Join G20, Plans Visit to Africa in 2023

By Tope Templer Olaiya, Washington DC

U.S. PRESIDENT, Joe Biden, recently, said he would support African Union (AU) joining the G20 group of large economies as a permanent member. He said this is part of Washington’s efforts to reinvigorate ties with the region. He added that over the next three years, the US would provide $55 billion in aid to Africa

Biden, speaking at a U.S.-Africa leaders summit event on the AU Agenda 2063, said the United States is looking to increase collaboration in all areas.

He said: “Africa belongs to the table in every room where global challenges are being discussed, and in every institution where discussions are holding. It’s been a long time in coming, but it’s going to come.”

South Africa is currently the only G20 member from Africa. The AU is made up of 55 member states. Biden’s remarks, and the summit, aim to position the United States as a partner to African countries

amid competition with China, which sought to expand its influence by funding infrastructure projects on the continent and elsewhere.

Chinese trade with Africa is about four times that of the United States, and Beijing has become an important creditor by offering cheaper loans – often with opaque terms and collateral requirements –than Western lenders.

Having a seat at the table could help some African nations, many of which are not currently eligible for debt treatments under the G20 plan, advance their interests.

It will also give them a bigger say in key issues such as, the response to the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change and mounting frustration that rich countries are not taking enough responsibility for years of rampant fossil fuel usage that has contributed to global warming.

Also, President Biden said he plans to visit Africa. “I’m eager to visit your continent. As I told some of

Biden Announces "President’s Advisory Council on African Diaspora Engagement in the United States"

Story by Reuters*

U.S. PRESIDENT Joe Biden announced the establishment of an advisory council on engagement with the African diaspora in the United States, as Washington seeks to deepen ties with the region through the U.S.-Africa Summit.

"African voices are essential to solving global problems. To elevate these voices, one of our primary focuses is to widen our circle of engagement to include African Diaspora communities," Dana Banks , special assistant to the president and special adviser for the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit, said.

It was not immediately clear who would be on the council but Banks said it would be made up of diverse representatives from African-American and African immigrant communities who have distinguished themselves in government, business, social work, sports and other areas.

"It will advise the President on a wide range of issues, enhance the dialogue between U.S. officials and the African Diaspora, and strengthen cultural, social, political, and economic ties between African communities, the global African Diaspora, and the United States," Banks said.

A spokesperson for the National Security Council said the African Diaspora includes African Americans, including descendants of enslaved Africans, and nearly 2 million African immigrants. Read the full executive order here.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/bidento-unveil-council-on-african-diaspora-in-unitedstates/ar-AA15d3XN

*Dawn team applied edits to the origital article.

you, when you invited me to your countries. I said, ‘Be careful what you wish for. Because I may show up.’”

The president added: “I’m looking forward to see many of you in your home countries.” However, Biden did not say, which African nations he plans to visit, nor when he would make the trip.

First Lady, Jill Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris will also visit Africa, the President, said, as well as Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken; Defence Secretary, Lloyd Austin; Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen and other officials.

“We’re all going to be seeing you and you’re going see a lot of us, because we’re deadly earnest and serious about this endeavour. And you’re going to see us deliver on our commitments.”

Former President Donald Trump was the first president since Ronald Reagan not to visit Africa. The last U.S. presidential trip to Africa came in

2013 when Barack Obama travelled to Senegal, South Africa and Tanzania.

The Biden administration, during the Summit, has worked to rebuild ties with African leaders after Trump never hosted a US-Africa Summit, which was started under Obama in 2014.

AU Chairman and President of Senegal, Macky Sall, expressed gratitude to Biden, and pleaded that economic sanctions that have crippled Zimbabwe’s economy should be rescinded.

“And with this summit, and with the African Unions Agenda 2063, our eyes are fixed squarely on the future. African voices, African leadership, African innovation all are critical to addressing the most pressing global challenges towards realising the vision we all share: a world that is free, a world that is open, prosperous, and secure.”

https://guardian.ng/news/biden-invites-au-to-joing20-plans-visit-to-africa-in-2023/

The United States has yet to officially apologize for the enslavement of African Americans, and many scholars and activists have called for some form of reparations for decades.

PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN this week commemorated the 160th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, which ended slavery during the U.S. Civil War. The proclamation, issued on Jan. 1, 1863, is one of the nation’s most treasured documents for human freedom.

“On New Year’s Day, 160 years ago today, President Abraham Lincoln changed America’s destiny forever. We were at the height of a raging Civil War, ‘a house divided’ along the dangerous

fault line of slavery,” said President Biden in an official White House statement released Monday evening.

With the Emancipation Proclamation, President Lincoln ended slavery in rebellious states that had seceded from the Union, thereby granting freedom to the enslaved in those states. The executive order also admitted newly “freed” Black men into the Army and Navy to fight for their freedom, or as the National Archives notes, “[enabled] the liberated to become liberators.”

In his statement, Biden praised President Lincoln, who “engaged in months of cautious deliberation,” adding, “His duty, he felt, was to do more than what he personally believed was morally right, but to represent the will of a fractured people.”

An exhibit of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation is shown at the National Archives Building February 18, 2005 in Washington, DC.

(Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

S, President Biden Commemorates 160th Anniversary of Lincoln’s mancipation Proclamation

Gerren Keith Gaynor

The 160th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation is a reminder of how far we’ve come as a country — and the work still to be done

Because the Emancipation Proclamation technically preserved the institution of slavery in states that remained within the Union, Biden acknowledged that Lincoln’s order “was not a perfect solution.” Still, he noted, “it began the active pursuit of perfection, the quest that persists to this day to realize the full promise of democracy in America.”

President Biden added, “With the stroke of a pen, President Lincoln aligned the future of our Nation with the challenge of our world, to end humanity’s war against itself, to recognize there is more that unites us than could ever divide us, and to finally reconcile ourselves with one another in peace.”

As the country marks the 160th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, the history of slavery remains a thorny issue in the United States. A current political movement amongst conservatives has attempted to thwart or alter how slavery is taught in American classrooms in the form of anti-critical race theory. The Republican-led efforts emerged in the years after the publishing of journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones’ Pulitzer Prize-winning, “The 1619 Project,” which reexamines slavery and the role of African Americans in pushing the United States closer to its ideal of democracy and liberty for all.

The United States has also yet to officially apologize for the enslavement of African Americans, and many scholars and activists have for decades called for some form of reparations. In Congress, there have been many attempts to pass H.R. 40, or the Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African-Americans Act. The bill, which was first introduced by U.S. Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., would create a commission to study the history of slavery and potential

reparations. However, despite being introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives several times since 1989, it has yet to advance out of committee and to a floor vote.

As theGrio previously reported, Black advocates, with support from some members of Congress, have called on President Biden to sign an executive order that would essentially do what H.R. 40 aimed to do, given congressional inaction. During the 2020 presidential campaign, Biden said that he supports a reparations commission and would sign H.R. 40 if passed by Congress. When asked by theGrio last summer whether Biden would instead sign an executive order, the White House said, “The president’s position hasn’t changed.”

As the 118th Congress is sworn into office on Jan. 3, President Biden will now govern with a divided Congress, as Republicans will hold a slim majority in the House. The chance of H.R. 40 being passed in this Congress remains unlikely.

In his statement acknowledging the anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, Biden projected a message of unity and bipartisanship — something he hopes will continue in the next Congress.

“Let us rejoice that freedom is our goal, and let us set aside our differences, break through bitter and divisive partisanship, our finger pointing and blame, and rise up to meet our great calling as a Nation,” the president said.

“Let us do all we can in 2023 to create ‘a new birth of freedom’ in the United States and ensure that ‘government of the people, by the people and for the people, shall not perish,’ but will shine like a sun, a beacon to all people, demonstrating that from the many our great Nation can become one.”

https://thegrio.com/2023/01/02/bidencommemorates-160th-anniversary-of-lincolnsemancipation-proclamation/

Call for Inputs on Upcoming Country Vis

United Nations International Independen

Justice and Equality in the context of Law

Issued by: International Independent Expert Mechanism to Input Deadline: 2

Purpose

To Collect information in preparation for the Expert Mechanism's visit to the United States of America scheduled to take place 24 April – 5 May 2023

Background

The mandate of the Expert Mechanism is detailed in resolution 47/21. The Expert Mechanism is mandated under paragraph 11 of the resolution to advance racial justice and equality in the context of law enforcement in all parts of the world by, inter alia conducting country visits, inclusive outreach, and consultations with States, directly affected individuals and communities, and other stakeholders, and taking into account an intersectional approach. The Expert Mechanism is comprised of three members- Justice Yvonne Mokgoro, Dr. Tracie Keesee, and Professor Juan Méndez.

Learn more about the Expert Mechanism here

During the mission, the Expert Mechanism will meet national stakeholders, including government officials including law enforcement authorities, civil society organisations, United Nations representatives, academics, lawyers, and victims. The Expert Mechanism will also conduct site visits and spend time outside the capital city to better understand the issues faced by Africans and people of African Descent in the country.

The Expert Mechanism will offer recommendations to support the Government's efforts in combatting structural and institutional racism, the excessive use of force, and other human rights violations by

law enforcement and the criminal justice system against Africans and people of African descent. The Expert Mechanism will present a mission report with its findings and recommendations.

Objectives

The Expert Mechanism seeks to understand the USA’s efforts in combatting structural and institutional racism, the excessive use of force, and other human rights violations by law enforcement against Africans and people of African descent, in the spirit of cooperation and dialogue.

During the visit, the Expert Mechanism will study:

• Systemic racism as a root cause of excessive use of force and other human rights violations by law enforcement against Africans and people of African descent.

• Access to justice, accountability, and redress for excessive use of force and other human rights violations by law enforcement officials against Africans and people of African descent.

• Alignment of domestic laws, policies, and practices on the use of force by law enforcement officials with international human rights norms and standards.

• Alignment of domestic laws, policies, and practices in the criminal justice system with international human rights norms and standards

• Good practices and lessons learned related to laws, policies and practices on racial justice and equality in the context of law enforcement and the justice system.

to the United States of America by the nt Expert Mechanism to Advance Racial w Enforcement from 24 April – 5 May 2023

o Advance Racial Justice and Equality in Law Enforcement

24 February 2023

Key questions and types of input/ comments sought

The Expert Mechanism would like to invite all interested individuals and organizations, including Africans and people of African descent, representatives of civil society organisations, experts, lawyers, and academics to send inputs ahead of their visit, such as:

• Recent analytical reports or surveys on Africans and People of African descent examining structural and institutional racism, excessive use of force, and other human rights violations by law enforcement and the criminal justice system against them in the USA.

• Information on the policies, programmes, practices, and legal framework concerning law enforcement, the criminal justice system and Africans and People of African descent in the USA.

• Information on emblematic cases concerning Africans and people of African descent and their interaction with law enforcement or the criminal justice system including any judicial action, accountability and reparation measures taken in the USA.

• Priority issues concerns and situations that warrant the Expert Mechanism's attention in the USA.

• Suggestions on issues to examine and related places to visit in the USA.

• Suggestions on government officials and civil

society actors to meet in different regions in the USA

How inputs will be used

Submission will remain confidential. They will be considered during the country visit and will be considered for the Expert Mechanism’s report on the country visit.

Next Steps

Input/comments may be sent by e-mail. They must be received by 24 February 2023.

Email address: ohchr-emler@un.org

Email subject line: 2023 Visit to the USA

Word limit: 2500 words

File formats: Word, PDF

Accepted languages: English

Our Work

The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights is the leading United Nations entity in the field of human rights, with a unique mandate to promote and protect all human rights for all people.

https://www.ohchr.org/en/calls-for-input/2023/ call-inputs-upcoming-country-visit-united-statesamerica-united-nations

Image credit: logodix.com, bindingtreaty.org

Africa Must Fight 'Strongman' Backslide, Ibrahim Says

By Joe Bavier

AFRICA MUST FIGHT against a slide towards strongman authoritarianism that has resulted in a series of military coups and a clampdown on civil society in many countries, Sudanese-British billionaire Mo Ibrahim said.

Ibrahim's foundation launched its Index of African Governance (IIAG) on Wednesday, January 25th, which warned that advances in human development and economic opportunities were undermined by worsening security and widespread democratic backsliding.

The study, which measured progress over the past decade on topics ranging from health and education to security and the rule of law, found that overall governance has flatlined since 2019.

Much of Africa, it said, is less safe, secure and democratic now than in 2012.

While many of the external shocks crippling the continent economically and socially in recent years were outside of Africans' control, in an interview ahead of the report's release, Ibrahim lamented what he called "an own goal".

"We did not cause climate change, but we are hit by it. We did not start the war in Ukraine, but we're hit by that. We did not start COVID, but we get hit by that. Then we have bad governance. We're responsible for it," he said.

Bright spots, according to data compiled by the foundation, include major progress in infrastructure construction across the continent, improved equality for women, and advances in health, education and environmental sustainability since 2012.

But that period has also witnessed worsening conflicts, particularly in West Africa's Sahel region, and political instability.

Ibrahim, who made his fortune in African telecommunications, said Africa was being swept up in a global authoritarian revival.

"We had 'Make America Great Again'. You have Turkey, Hungary, Russia, Syria, China. It's all around us," he said.

"We started to see coups d'etat, which we thought was something in the past. We started to see this phenomenon of the strongman ... It's something we need to fight back against."

Military officers have seized political control in countries including Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso and Sudan. Traditional pressure in the form of sanctions and political isolation has largely failed to dislodge them.

But Ibrahim said that, despite what he termed the current "sad place globally" for democratic values, he remained optimistic.

"I put my faith in the young people. Look at those young kids in Sudan," he said.

"For three years now they're in streets. They want democracy, freedom, things they've never experienced in their lives. When I see those guys, I have hope."

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/africa-mustfight-strongman-backslide-billionaire-ibrahimsays-2023-01-25/

Image credit: assuredstudy.org, africabriefing.org

Dear Friend,

After successfully welcoming our inaugural cohort of Voyager Scholarship for Public Service recipients to the Obama Foundation community, we are excited to announce that we are, once again, searching for 100 undergraduate students who will make up our next class of Voyagers!

Do you know a rising junior here in the United States interested in working towards positive change with a desire to travel and expand their horizons? Are they bridge builders in their communities and eager to learn from others? If so, I hope you’ll help us spread the word and encourage them to apply to our 2023 Voyager Scholarship for Public Service.

The Voyager Scholarship for Public Service includes:

 Up to $50,000 in financial aid: Students will receive up to $25,000 per year in “last dollar” financial aid for their junior and senior years of college.

 Summer Voyage: Students will receive a $10,000 stipend and Airbnb credit to pursue a summer work-travel experience between their junior and senior year of college.

 Fall Summit: Each fall, students will be invited to a summit to help define and inspire their public service journey.

 Network of leaders: Throughout the program, students will be invited to an ongoing speaker series, giving them access to a network of leaders. This network of leaders will expose them to new areas of service and innovations happening in their fields. After graduation, they will join the Obama Foundation’s global community, providing them with Foundation resources and programming.

 10-year travel stipend: After graduation, Airbnb will provide the students with a $2,000 Airbnb travel credit every year for 10 years, totaling $20,000. This will allow students to continue to broaden their horizons and forge new connections throughout their public service careers.

Please share this opportunity widely to your networks and to students who you think may be a good fit! If you or someone you know would benefit from this enriching program experience, please encourage them to apply now

Applications close on Wednesday, March 22, 2023 at 3:00 PM CT.

We look forward to welcoming the next class of Voyagers into the Obama Foundation family!

All of my best,

Valerie Jarrett

Chief Executive Officer, Obama Foundation

© 2023 Obama Foundation

The Barack Obama Foundation

5235 S. Harper Court, Suite 1140

Chicago, IL, USA 60615

Image credit: branditechture.agency

African Stock Exchange/Bourse

• Algeria Algiers Stock Market

• Angola

• Botswana

• Cameroon

Angola Stock Exchange and Derivatives

Botswana Stock Exchange

Douala Stock Exchange

• Cape Verde Islands Bolsa de Valores of Cape Verde (in Portuguese)

• Cote de Ivoire Bourse Regionale des Valeurs Mobilieres - UEMOA (Abidjan)

• Egypt

• Ethiopia

• Ghana

• Kenya

• Libya

The Egyptian Exchange

Ethiopia Commodity Exchange

Ghana Stock Exchange

Nairobi Stock Exchange

Libyan Stock Market

• Malawi Malawi Stock Exchange

• Mauritius Stock Exchange of Mauritius

• Morocco

Casablanca Stock Exchange

• Mozambique Bolsa Valores de Mocambique

• Namibia Namibian Stock Exchange

• Nigeria Nigerian Stock Exchange

• Rwanda

• Seychelles

Nigerian Stock Exchange

Rwanda Stock Exchange

Seychelles Securities Exchange

• Somalia Somali Stock Exchange

• South Africa

Bond Exchange of South Africa

Johannesburg Stock Exchange

Johannesburg Stock Exchange

• South Sudan

• Swaziland

• Tanzania

• Tunisia

• Uganda

• Zambia

• Zimbabwe

Khartoum Stock Exchange

Swaziland Stock Exchange

Dar es Salaam Stock Exchange

Tunisia Stock Exchange

Uganda Securities Exchange

Lusaka Stock Exchange

Victoria Falls Stock Exchange

• Zimbabwe Zimbabwe Stock Exchange

Lilongwe, Malawi faceofmalawi.com

German Companies Plan to Invest More in Africa in 2023

By Rene Wagner

GERMAN COMPANIES want to boost their activities in Africa next year, especially in areas such as green hydrogen and liquefied natural gas, with 43% planning to increase investment in the continent, a survey seen by Reuters on Tuesday showed.

The poll of members of the German-African Business Association also showed that a further 39% of Association's members aim to keep their spending levels in Africa stable.

"The majority of companies want to expand their activities in the coming year," Association head Christoph Kannegiesser told Reuters. "It makes sense, because the continent is still on a growth trajectory."

German companies invested about 1.6 billion euros in Africa in 2021, of which about 1.1 billion euros went to the sub-Sahara region, according to economy ministry data.

As Europe's biggest economy has been seeking to reduce its reliance on Russia for gas since the invasion of Ukraine, Kannegiesser said he sees big opportunities in the energy sector in Africa.

"The field of green hydrogen and liquefied gas will give a new impetus in many countries," he said, highlighting Senegal, Nigeria and Mauritania as countries with investment potential.

Namibia could also profit

massively from green hydrogen production, said Kannegiesser.

The survey showed that 56% of the companies viewed their business activities in Africa in 2022 positively and a further 7% rated them "very good."

The Association, which says it represents around 85% of German businesses active in Africa, wants the government to give greater support through improved conditions for export credit insurance and investment guarantees from the German government to ensure African business is not left to the United States and China.

The Association has criticized

a law taking effect on Jan. 1 which obliges big companies to act against human rights and climate violations, saying it is counter-productive as it creates a new layer of bureaucracy.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/ neon-money-club-founder-lukebailey-raises-4-4-million-for-hispre-product-and-pre-launch/

Image: https://www.afrikaverein.de/ en/market-entry-africa/partner-inafrica/

Reporting by Rene Wagner Writing by Madeline Chambers; editing by David Evans

Africa will Outperform the World in Economic Growth, AfDB Projects

By Nest - bird's virtual newsroom

IN THE INAUGURAL RELEASE of a report dubbed ‘Africa’s Macroeconomic Performance and Outlook’ released on Jan.19, the African Development Bank Group reported that “growth across all five African regions was positive in 2022 and the outlook for 2023–24 is projected to be stable.”

The projections are higher than expected global figures (2.7% and 3.2% respectively) for the same period.

Africa’s top five performing economies before the covid-19 pandemic are expected to grow by over 5.5% on average in 2023-2024 and reclaim their position among the world’s ten fastest-growing economies.

Those include Rwanda, which is projected to grow by 7.9%, Côte d’Ivoire by 7.1%, Benin by 6.4%, Ethiopia by 6.0%, and Tanzania by 5.6%.

African countries that will experience positive economic growth

But there is a clutch of other African countries that are also expected to grow their economies by more than 5.5% in the same period. Those include Niger at 9,6%, Senegal at 9.4%, The Democratic Republic of Congo at 6.8%, The Gambia at 6.4%, Mozambique at 6.5% and Togo at 6.3%.

In east Africa, growth is projected to rise from 4.2% in 2022 to 5% in 2023 and 5.4% in 2024, with Rwanda leading the region.

Uganda and Ethiopia are also projected to grow strongly in 2023 and 2024, exceeding 5% due to developments in the oil sector for Uganda and continued infrastructure spending for Ethiopia.

Growth in west Africa is projected to rise from 3.6% in 2022 to 4.1% in 2023 and 4.3% in 2024, with Côte d’Ivoire and Senegal boosting the region’s growth.

Central and Southern Africa projections

Central Africa is projected to see a slight decline from 4.7% in 2022 to 4.3% in 2023 and to stabilize at 4.2% in 2024.

The southern African region, weighed down by economic woes in South Africa, has the lowest growth rates, despite standout performer, Mozambique.

“In the medium term, however, persistent weakness in South Africa will continue to weigh on the region, with real output projected to decelerate to 2.3% in 2023 before rising to 2.8% in 2024.”

Growth in the south will be primarily driven by Mozambique, which will see economic growth boosted by investment in liquefied natural gas and allied industries.

In northern Africa, growth is projected to stabilise at 4.3% in 2023, supported by an expected strong recovery in Libya and Morocco.

‘Africa is the place to invest’

Economist Jeffrey Sachs believes such trends show that “Africa can and will rise to a growth of 7% or more per year consistently in the coming decades.”

“Africa will be the fast-growing part of the world economy. Africa is the place to invest,” he noted during the report’s launch.

According to Akinwumi Adesina, African Development Bank Group president, the overall steady growth witnessed across the board is commendable because it is seen despite “the pass-through effects of global shocks hitting hard and differing by region and by country.”

Like the rest of the world, Africa is significantly

challenged by soaring food and energy prices, tighter global financial conditions, and increased domestic debt.

“Household Impacts of Tariffs, a survey, indicates, in 29 African countries, households spent on average 36.3% of their income on food items,” the report reads in part.

Effects of war in Ukraine

A similarly high burden is registered in the case of energy prices amidst supply cuts due to the Russia-Ukraine war.

“Crude oil prices increased by about 20%, from $93.50 per barrel to $112.40 and averaged $102.80 between March and October 2022,” the report reveals.

Amidst these challenges, the report calls for robust monetary and fiscal measures backed by structural policies to address potential risks.

With inflationary pressures anticipated to heighten between 2023 and 2024, the report recommends various measures depending on the degree of impact and vulnerability in individual countries.

In countries where inflation is most acute, timely and aggressive monetary policies are advised.

“Countries with lower inflation will need to undertake cautious tightening of monetary policy so as not to undermine growth efforts while keeping inflation in check.”

African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA)

However, the report underscores the continent’s outstanding opportunities, mainly focusing on the need for countries to accelerate the implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).

According to the report, the AfCFTA has the potential to create a competitive continental market that will cushion the continent from multiple shocks.

The World Economic Forum projects a growth of 28% in intra-African freight demand thanks to AfCFTA, which will open up a need for nearly 2 million trucks, 100,000 rail wagons, 250 aircraft and more than 100 vessels by 2030.

https://qz.com/africa-will-outperform-the-world-ineconomic-growth-af-1850039139

Image credit: https://umaizi.com/the-complete-guideto-investing-in-africa/

THE WORLD BANK is seeking to vastly expand its lending capacity to address climate change and other global crises and will negotiate with shareholders ahead of April meetings on proposals that include a capital increase and new lending tools, according to an "evolution roadmap" seen by Reuters on Monday, January 2nd.

The roadmap document - sent to shareholder governments - marks the start of a negotiation process to alter the bank's mission and financial resources and shift it away from a country- and project-specific lending model used since its creation at the end of World War Two.

The World Bank management aims to have specific proposals to change its mission, operating model and financial capacity ready for approval by the joint World Bank and International Monetary Fund Development Committee in October, according to the document.

A World Bank spokesman said that the document aimed to provide details on the scope, approach, and timetable for the evolution, with regular updates for shareholders and decisions later in the year.

AAA RATING TO STAY

The development lender will explore options like a potential new capital increase, changes to its capital structure to unlock more lending and new financing tools such as guarantees for private

Reuters Exclusive: World Bank Seeks More Funds to Address Climate Change, Other Crises

By David Lawder

sector loans and other ways to mobilize more private capital, according to the document.

But the World Bank Group (WBG) is not ready to bow to demands from some non-profit organizations to abandon its longstanding top-tier credit rating to boost lending, stating: "Management will explore all options that increase the capacity of the WBG whilst maintaining the AAA rating of the WBG entities."

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has called for the World Bank and others to revamp their business models to boost lending and harness private capital to fund investments that more broadly benefit the world, such as helping middle-income countries transition away from coal power.

A U.S. Treasury spokesperson declined comment on the World Bank document.

The bank said proposals under consideration include higher statutory lending limits, lower equity-to-loan requirements and the use of callable capital - money pledged but not paid in by member governments - for lending.

Development experts say this shift would greatly increase the amount of lending compared to the current capital structure, which only utilizes paid-in capital.

"The challenges the world is facing call for a massive step up in the international community's

support," the bank said in the document. "For the WBG to continue to play a central role in development and climate finance, it will need a concerted effort by both shareholders and management to step up WBG financing capacity."

INADEQUATE FUNDING

The roadmap document cautions that a build-up of lending for climate change, health care, food security and other needs may require a capital increase to boost the capacity of the World Bank's middle-income lending arm, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD).

IBRD's $13 billion capital increase in 2018 "was designed to be prepared for one mid-sized crisis a decade, and not multiple, overlapping crises" including the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine and the effects of accelerating climate change, the document said. IBRD's crisis buffers will likely be depleted by mid-2023, it said.

Another option, according to the roadmap, is for World Bank shareholder countries to step up periodic contributions to the lender's fund for the world's poorest countries, the International Development Association (IDA), which have declined in recent years despite increasing needs.

The roadmap also offers the option of creating a new concessional lending trust fund for middleincome countries that would focus on global public goods and be similar in structure to IDA, with regular funding replenishments that would be separate from the bank's capital structure.

"Such a fund may attract donor bilateral resources separate from shareholder budget lines supporting the WBG, and potentially include donors beyond shareholders," such as private foundations, the bank said.

The bank said that the evolution of its mission to increase climate lending while maintaining good development outcomes will require additional staff and budget resources, which have declined 3% in real terms over the past 15 years..

https://www.reuters.com/business/sustainablebusiness/world-bank-seeks-more-fundsaddress-climate-change-other-crisesdocument-2023-01-03/

Image credit: world bank

African Union Procurement and Trade Apps

TheAfrican Union (AU) is a steward of public funds and therefore both AU and its suppliers must adhere to the highest ethical standards, both during the bidding process and throughout the execution of a contract.

The AU Procurement Division under the Administration and Human Resource Management(AHRM) is responsible for the for the acquisition of a wide variety of goods, works and services for the AU Headquarters, AU Organ,Peace Support Mission, Regional Representative Office, Specialised and Technical Agency and Liaison Office etc.

Visit the Bids/Procurement pages of the AU website to review open bids - https://au.int/en/ bids.

Visit Google PlayStore or iPhone xxxx to install the AU Procurement app on your devices.

TheAfCFTA Hub brings together the AfCFTA Secretariat, national governments and major private sector innovators in a unified digital framework known as the “AfCFTA Hub Network” (https://www.afcfta.app). Sign up for an account to gain access to a growing range of features, modules and platforms bundled seamlessly into one Super-App. Explore this AfCFTA Digital Ecosystem - use what you need to get what you want. Wherever you are in Africa, we have got your back. Register your business to take advantage of access to the 41 countries that have ratified the AfCFTA Treaty.

ROUGHLY 30 YEARS AGO , South Central Los Angeles went up in flames.

Several days of rioting sparked on April 29, 1992, in response to the acquittal of four white policemen tied to the brutal beating of Rodney King, an unarmed Black motorist, a year earlier. The vicious beating was caught on film and eventually aired on networks for the entire nation to witness. Within hours of the announcement of the acquittal from the jury—which did not have a single Black juror— Los Angeles was engulfed in one of the worst civil

disruptions in American history: with 50 people killed, more than 2,300 injured and about 1,100 damaged buildings at the cost of about $1 billion. Among its most devastated communities: South Central L.A.

From those ashes rose an organization committed to economic empowerment and social justice. That thrust was voiced by enterprising John Hope Bryant when he founded Operation HOPE Inc. on May 5 of that year to change the status of legions locked in poverty. He began his

John Hope Bryant (l) and Bishop T.D. Jakes speak on stage during the 9th Annual HOPE Global Forums at the Hyatt Regency Atlanta on December 13, 2022 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Derek White/ Getty Images for Operation HOPE, Inc.)

Operation Hope Celebrates 30 Years of Advancing Financial Empowerment as it Sets New Black Wealth Agenda

By Derek T. Dingle

campaign to move “from civil rights in the streets to silver rights in the suites” with a Bankers Bus tour to encourage investment within low-income communities by taking a small group of financial executives throughout distressed areas of L.A, Washington, D.C., and Atlanta, among other urban hubs.

Over the past three decades, Bryant has built the largest nonprofit dedicated to financial education and building partnerships with some of the nation’s financial services leviathans to meet its mission: Helping the poor and disenfranchised gain pathways to opportunity and wealth.

A few weeks ago, I attended the Annual Hope Global Forums held at the Hyatt Regency Atlanta in the ballroom where Martin Luther King, Jr. launched the final campaign of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1967, months before an assassin’s bullet slew the civil rights leader. It was the first in-person gathering since the pandemic and two years after the slaying of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers—this time, the act of police misconduct was captured on video via cell phone, viewed throughout the globe in real-time, and initiated a renewed call for an end to systemic discrimination and a series of corporate equity pledges.

This year’s event not only celebrated Operation HOPE’s three decades of achievements of serving more than 4 million individuals and directing more than $3.2 billion in economic activity into underserved communities nationwide, but it also sought to set the wealth agenda for Black Americans for 2023—and beyond. The Forum boasted roughly 5,000 delegates from 40 countries

and included more than 1 million online viewers. Bryant asserts that the largest event of its kind has been designed “to reimagine the global economy, so the benefits and opportunities of free enterprise are extended to everyone.”

As with previous forums, it presented an eclectic group of powerhouse speakers such as civil rights legend Ambassador Andrew Young, Bishop T.D. Jakes, rapper-entrepreneur Killer Mike, SBA Administrator Isabella Casillas Guzman, MSNBC President Rashida Jones, Delta Airlines CEO Ed Bastien, former Chief of Staff for Donald Trump, Mick Mulvaney, NASCAR President Steve Phelps, NBA Hall of Famer and entrepreneur Grant Hill, and U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA), who had recently won a full term after defeating Republican and former Dallas Cowboys running back Herschel Walker in a contentious run-off election.

Under the theme, “Bridging The Divide,“ this year’s forum focused on finding solutions through wealth-building strategies, inclusive economics, and across-the-board equitable access. “The next move is about opportunity. The first Reconstruction in the 1800s focused on freedom. The second Reconstruction in the 1960s was about access. The third Reconstruction—2020 to 2030—will be about opportunity,” Bryant told the audience in the jam-packed ballroom. “You’re living in a moment of history.”

That quote from Bryant summed up the wealthsee page 76

“Homeownership is the No. 1 way to build wealth”

Black Wealth Agenda from page 75

building discussion—and for good reason. The yawning homeownership divide between Black and white families is now wider than it was more than 60 years ago, according to US Census Data. In 2022, 74.6% of white households owned homes versus 45.3% of Black households, a gap of more than 29 points. In 1960, the white homeownership rate was 65%, compared to the Black rate at 38%, a 27-point gap—before the 1968 Fair Housing Act and other civil rights legislation were enacted to remedy housing discrimination and create equitable opportunities.

During the opening plenary, Bryant interviewed Kristy Fercho, Wells Fargo’s Head of Diverse Segments, Representation and Inclusion, about the expansion of Black homeownership. Without further elaboration, Bryant mentioned that Wells Fargo, a long-time sponsor, “has a complicated history” and that he has held conversations with its CEO Charles W. Scharf about the bank’s corrective action in recent years.

Fercho maintains the main reasons she agreed to join the bank in 2021, a year after the George Floyd tragedy: “I want to put more Blacks in homes. Homeownership is still the single largest purchase we will make [and] still the best pathway we have to generational wealth.” Fercho says she has taken the lead in the development and execution of the bank’s $150 million program to help roughly 60,000 Black customers refinance their homes and reduce their mortgage rates.

Among the commitments Fercho announced was the creation of 120 new HOPE Inside locations to offer financial education services to enable community members to boost savings, improve credit scores, and shrink debt to convert more renters into homeowners.

Operation HOPE currently has 200 such locations that provide financial counseling at various branches and workplaces of banking and corporate partners, including Bank of America, Truist, Synchrony, Delta, and UPS, among scores of others.

To meet the homeownership mandate, Bank of America has also pledged Operation Hope to provide free financial counseling in 180

financial centers across 17 U.S. markets.

Bryant also brought together business leaders to discuss financial education’s value and ensure that youth—from K-college—can learn about money matters as an academic requirement.

Walmart President and CEO Doug McMillon serves as Financial Literacy For All co-chair, which Bryant launched as a joint initiative with the big box retailer, Bank of America, Disney, and other corporations.

Strengthening Black businesses

Operation HOPE announced the continued expansion of its 1 Million Black Business (1MBB) initiative and has supported more than 155,000 unique businesses through its HOPE Inside network and 1MBB partners. According to the soon-to-be-released 1MBB 2022 Impact Report, the program has helped about 5% of all Blackowned businesses in the U.S. thus far.

Through its alliance with Shopify, Operation Hope launched the initiative in October 2020 to help create and support up to 1 million new Blackowned businesses by 2030. Shopify committed resources valued at approximately $130 million. In addition, Operation HOPE has built a coalition of more than 60 other corporate, government, and private partners, including SBA, the NFL, MasterCard, Comcast, and Clark Atlanta University.

The Forum also featured the second annual 1MBB Pitch Competition, featuring four innovative Black entrepreneurs who shared their personal and business journeys for the opportunity to win a total of $50,000. Operation Hope and Shopify developed the competition, with PayPal as its title sponsor.

Following a nationwide competition, the 2nd annual 1MBB pitch finalists were Kalene McElveen, owner of Tastefull Vegan Frozen Desserts, which took first-place honors with a $2,500 grant from Shopify and $15,000 from PayPal; Jazmin Richards, founder and CEO of BLK Sunflowers. A candle manufacturer, which gained second place and a $2,500 grant from Shopify and $10,000 from PayPal; Joshua Dixon, founder and designer of apparel maker Admire Wear, who won a $2,500 grant from Shopify and $8,000 from PayPal; and Stacy Howell, owner of Woodhouse Spa, who took

home a $2,500 grant from Shopify and $7,000 from PayPal.

In Bryant’s conversation with Jakes, the senior pastor of the Dallas-based megachurch Potters House applauded the need to launch and support Black entrepreneurial endeavors. Still, he asserted the need for Black firms to scale up for greater impact as viable employment and investment sources.

“One of the problems with our businesses is that they have two to three employees at most. They’re so busy doing the work, they’re not thinking about the business,” says Jakes. “I have to strategize

the business. I have to integrate the business. They don’t understand the difference between busyness and business.”

Bryant and Operation HOPE will continue emphasizing the most vital plank for the next wealth agenda: Opportunity.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/operation-hopecelebrates-30-years-of-advancing-financialempowerment-as-it-sets-new-black-wealth-agenda/ Image credit: PR Newswire

Group picture includes Bishop T.D. Jakes, John Hope Bryant, Killer Mike, Ambassador Andrew Young, Charlemange tha God. a (Image: Courtesy of Operation HOPE)

SPATIAL LABS , the leading infrastructure company powering new technologies to redefine the consumer experience for the next generation, announced recently a $10 million seed funding round led by Blockchain Capital, a leading venture firm in the blockchain industry.

Jay-Z’s Marcy Venture Partners has also returned to participate in this round. The close of the seed round brings the company’s total funding to over $14 million.

“Our investment in Spatial Labs reflects our view that this technology presents an unparalleled opportunity to solve some of the landscape’s most

Spatial Labs Secures $10M in S

By Black Enterprise Editors

complex challenges,” said Bart Stephens, Founder & Managing Partner of Blockchain Capital.

“By empowering new business models, delivering immersive experiences, and providing insights into consumer needs, Spatial Labs will continue to shape and power the future of commerce and connectivity in Web3.”

“Spatial Labs is designing next-gen technologies to connect brands to younger demographics that shop and interact with products in completely new ways. Through our technology solutions, we provide brands with rich consumer data and previously inaccessible revenue models,” said Iddris Sandu, Founder of Spatial Labs.

“The consumer goods industry is at a pivotal inflection point. Partnering with ambitious, innovative investors that align with our core ethos will enable Spatial Labs to continue to deliver the tangible innovations that brands and consumers are asking for.”

The new capital will support efforts to scale and diversify Spatial Labs’ proprietary blockchainenabled tech stack, deepen the company’s footprint across the consumer goods landscape, and expand into other industries, including media and entertainment. It will also be allocated towards a range of technical, business, and strategic team development efforts targeting C-Suite executives. These initiatives are intended to accelerate Spatial Lab’s consumer-centric product innovation and continued rapid growth.

“Spatial Labs has already demonstrated incredible innovation in technology and culture. Iddris and team have the acumen to seamlessly connect products in the physical and digital world, making products that drive user joy,” said Larry Marcus Co-Founder and Managing Director of Marcy Venture Partners.

This marks the second investment from Marcy Ventures Partners, following a pre-seed raise of $4

Iddris Sandu, Founder of Spatial Labs. (Courtesy)

Seed Funding Led by Blockchain Capital

million in 2021 to support the debut of Spatial Labs and launch of LNQ, an innovative, state-of-the-art chip platform that uses blockchain technology to authenticate products and unlock digital twins.

Founded by 25-year-old entrepreneur and business creative Iddris Sandu, Spatial Labs is committed to creating vertically integrated hardware and software solutions that serve as a physical entry point into the digital world – while delivering real-world utility. The LNQ One Chip, a proprietary 13mm microchip, allows any item to be scaled into a traceable digital asset on the blockchain and provides owners with a digital ledger that tracks a physical item’s authenticity, origin, ownership history, real-time value and enables added benefits such as loyalty incentives, enhanced insights and more.

In addition to empowering more conscious consumption, the LNQ One Chip opens new post-secondary revenue models and is poised to completely revolutionize the brand-to-consumer relationship in the physical and digital world. This technology provides an effective end-all solution for brands, retailers, and creators to reach and engage with their core audience, resulting in increased loyalty and consumer lifetime value.

The LNQ On-Chain Network is powered by Polygon, the leading blockchain development platform offering scalable, affordable, secure, and sustainable blockchains for Web3. The two companies partnered in December to release their first official collaboration, ‘Orbs by Spatial Labs’ x Polygon, a double-layered cotton crewneck embedded with the signature LNQ One Chip. The exclusive offering features a generative graphic on the front and branding on the back. By scanning the Orb, users can view an exclusive AR experience and gain access to future drops and Spatial Labs + Polygon ticketed events.

Since its inception in 2020, Spatial Labs has

delivered the most innovative hardware-software infrastructure shaping the future of commerce, consumer experience, and connectivity between brands and the next generation. For more information on Spatial Labs, please visit slabs. one

ABOUT BLOCKCHAIN CAPITAL

Founded in 2013, Blockchain Capital is one of the earliest and most active investors in the blockchain technology industry and the crypto ecosystem. Blockchain Capital has raised seven and deployed five prior venture funds, including the first ever ICO of a venture fund (BCAP) in April of 2017. The firm is based in San Francisco and was founded by serial entrepreneurs and Silicon Valley investors Bart Stephens and Brad Stephens. To learn more, please visit www.blockchaincapital. com or follow @blockchaincap on Twitter.

ABOUT MARCY VENTURE PARTNERS

Marcy Venture Partners (MVP) was Co-Founded by Shawn Carter (JAY-Z), Jay Brown and Larry Marcus.

MVP has a passion for building game-changing businesses and mass-market brands. The firm invests in Consumer & Culture with an emphasis on positive impact including sustainability, inclusivity, accessibility, empowerment and health & wellness. Our companies are led by exceptional management teams with clear vision, purpose and executional excellence. We lead or co-invest in companies that have meaningful brand values, high customer joy driven by an outstanding product, demonstrated growth and clear catalysts for the next level of scale. https://www.marcyvp. com.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/spatial-labs-secures10m-in-seed-funding-led-by-blockchain-capital/

LVRN Aims to Expand to Africa Thanks to MUSIC CEO Matt

Pincus, Who's Invested Over $25M

By Shanique Yates

LOVE RENAISSANCE (LVRN) is home to some of today’s hottest R&B acts and they may just continue to get better with time thanks to this latest investment from MUSIC — the first-ever diversified investment company focused exclusively on music and music-adjacent businesses.

Onward & Upward

According to a press release, the investment — which Bloomberg reports is worth more than $25 million — will provide capital geared toward growth for LVRN.

“At MUSIC, we invest with a people first mindset,” said MUSIC co-founder and CEO Matt Pincus. “Junia, Justice, Tunde, Sean, and Carlon – along with Amber Grimes and the rest of the LVRN team, are among the finest executives in the music business. They have built a leading platform and culture at a time when independents are going to

play an increasingly crucial role in breaking new artists. LVRN has limitless potential here in the U.S., and around the world. We are grateful for the opportunity to go on their journey with them.”

Tunde Balogun, President of LVRN, also made a statement: “Matt is not simply an investor, but an entrepreneur through and through. Before founding MUSIC, he built his own independent music publishing company SONGS into one of the most successful and respected operations in our business. His hard-earned expertise make him a very valuable resource for LVRN and we are so fortunate to have him play a role in our continued expansion. This infusion of capital will empower us to continue to expand our operations globally and support local Black-founded businesses as we do so.” The Journey

In 2012, LVRN was birthed by the five founding members while they were still students at Georgia State University.

Since then, they have been the driving force behind the careers of some of R&B’s biggest breakout acts including Summer Walker, 6lack, Shelley (fka DRAM), Kitty Ca$h, and more.

Today, the founders continue to expand their Atlanta imprint within the Castleberry Hill neighborhood. From purchasing a building in the

area to building out new state-of-the-art facilities, the LVRN takeover is still underway.

A Renaissance... For Real

Aside from building up the careers of today’s hottest stars, LVRN is also placing its stake in radio through its very own weekly SiriusXM show committed to introducing new talent to its fan base.

Additionally, their publishing partnership with Warner Chappell began in early 2021 and expands upon the label’s origin story — to cater to the development of artists.

“We are now committing the same focus and approach with publishing to develop the best songwriters, producers, and artists,” said Balogun at the time, according to Billboard.

With its latest funding, LVRN aims to “expand benefits and programs for its employees and continue to expand around the world, with a key focus in the U.K. and West Africa.”

https://afrotech.com/lvrn-aims-to-expand-to-africathanks-to-25m-investment?mc_cid=3e55260a78&mc_ eid=97e0d77340

Image credit: YouTube, Uproxx

Earn Your Leisure: The Making of a Financial Education Empire

By John Kennedy

ON A BREEZY NOVEMBER NIGHT, a sold-out crowd in Manhattan’s Hulu Theater at Madison Square Garden is losing its shit. The event’s marquee acts are preparing to take the stage, and everyone is on their feet, many raising phones in the air to capture the epic entrance. Smoke plumes. Pyrotechnics blaze. Blaring from the speakers is Nas’ 1999 classic “Hate Me Now”—the music video for which features a fur-clad Esco jostling through a nightclub alongside a belligerent Puff Daddy. However, the two men who step on stage donning minks tonight are neither Nas nor Diddy— in fact, they’re not rappers at all.

The people are here to see Rashad Bilal (38) and Troy Millings (40), better known as the cofounders of the financial fluency brand Earn Your Leisure. What began as two childhood friends setting out on a mission to educate young people on personal finance has grown into a massively popular eponymous podcast—the flagship of its own network—as well as the online subscription learning portal EYL University, a TV series on Revolt, and in-person conferences and recordings like the one taking place here at the Garden.

Tonight’s festivities are branded as a live taping of Market Mondays, a spinoff podcast that is hyper focused on making money in the stock market and also features Ian Dunlap, a highly successful investor from Houston. Elsewhere on the bill is real estate tycoon Don Peebles, undefeated boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr., and special guest performer Jadakiss. The lineup is a microcosm of Earn Your Leisure’s not-so-secret sauce: A mashup of major-key financial education funneled through hip-hop culture, language, and aesthetic. Perhaps the greatest flex pulled off by Millings, a former physical education teacher, and Bilal, a financial advisor, is helping to make investing, entrepreneurship, and money matters sexy at a time when it’s as crucial as ever.

…It’s for all of the reasons listed above that LEVEL is crowning Rashad and Troy as the 2023

Entrepreneurs to Watch, and the stars of our Winter ‘23 digital cover

Following that knowledge-packed night at MSG—and weeks of media stops, podcast appearances, and speaking engagements in various cities—I phoned in to speak with them at their Westchester studio to discuss the Earn Your Leisure explosion, meme stocks, memes about LLCs, and economic trends to watch in the new year.

LEVEL: Explain for me the feeling of being two kids from New York who started a podcast based on financial education that has grown into a global brand that has sold out massive venues in London, Manhattan, and Atlanta this year. That sounds surreal.

Rashad Bilal: It was definitely a moment. Everything we do I feel is an opportunity to make history, 'cause it's never been done before. London was an experience within itself because that was our first international event of that magnitude in one of the most prestigious venues in the world. When you go to Royal Hall, the history is so rich. That's where The Beatles performed, Adele, Muhammad Ali. It's just so much history, and it's a beautiful venue. To be there and have 4,000 people— majority Black Brits hungry for financial literacy, hungr y for good representations of themselves— that energy was amazing.

Then, like you said, coming from New York it’s a dream and an honor to be at the Garden a couple of weeks later and sell that out as well. Just seeing the name on the billboard a was very big moment for what we represent as far as financial literacy, the culture, New York City, everything. It was a very humbling experience.

Troy Millings: Surreal is the word. And humbling. We're talking about prestigious venues, and the reason we're there makes it even more gratifying. We're not doing it because we can shoot a threepointer, box, or wrestle. We provide education. It's very rewarding. Our community is in need of it, and the fact that they show up in droves speaks to how far impact can go.

LEVEL: I’m sure you never imagined this when you started out, but at what point did this become something you could see for yourself?

MILLINGS: Now that we look back—he comes from a career in finance, I come from a career in education. Those two things together make perfect sense when you talk about financial history, teaching, and understanding finance. Did I see this vision long term? Not when I was teaching. I knew I wanted to educate and what was being taught wasn't going to be applicable for the students I was teaching, which was why financial literacy became something I was like, I gotta be passionate about this 'cause this is going to help them out in their future. When I told Rashad about it, it was like, let's just scale this program and help as many young people as we can. Then we realized there's no age limit to learning. Young adults needed it, their parents needed it, their grandparents needed it. And so now we expanded to something that has no boundaries.

BILAL: This was the year of expansion in every aspect. From InvestFest having 4,000 people last year to 14,000 people this year, to doing our first international event, to doing Madison Square Garden—everything got amplified this year. We've been able to spread the message of financial

literacy from niche pockets of people to becoming more and more mainstream.

LEVEL: Tell me about the podcast’s early days. Was it a process to find your voice, learn your interview style, and develop it into what it’s become?

MILLINGS: There were things we had to learn, but we have a natural chemistry. We grew up together. We pretty much talked to each other every day—there just wasn't microphones around. In the beginning, it was just me and him. Finding our voices, our balance, our cadence, the information we're going to present, how to record—that takes time. We wanna make sure we're providing the best information and are as transparent as possible so our audience can understand it. We were super intentional about that. We knew we were able to give information in a way that it hadn't been delivered before. When we're sitting down with somebody, the way we interview, we're asking questions 'cause we want to know. But we have a general background in the area and study the person before they even come on.

LEVEL: After launching in 2019, did it feel like there was a tipping point for Earn Your Leisure? A point where people became more tuned in?

BILAL: It was just a snowball effect, honestly. Once we started, we had momentum. We just kept working and it kept moving. But Covid was pivotal. We doubled down on content when everybody was at home. We created another show called Market Mondays, which is very successful. So Covid was definitely an accelerator. Steve Harvey gave us a lot of mainstream appeal. People all over the world watched that interview—that's our biggest to date, very pivotal.

LEVEL: The biggest finance story during the pandemic was the meme stock frenzy led by GameStop. What role did Earn Your Leisure play in helping investors navigate that wild time?

MILLINGS: We played a couple of roles. When we talk about meme stocks, we're really talking about retail investors. In 2020 and 2021, the number of retail investors had increased—especially in our community—by 60% or something like that. In times of uncertainty, education becomes paramount. When we were talking about the stock market see page 84

Earn Your Leisure from page 83

and how to invest on Market Mondays, people were gravitating toward it. The market was so low, everyone was making money. And what happens when you help people make money? They come back for more and they tell their friends. That helped elevate us. We always stress long-term investing and not just looking at short-term trades as the way to build portfolios. So having retail investors being in the space, but also them having education around what a meme stock is, how it could be very volatile, and how you could lose money very quickly. That was vitally important, too.

LEVEL: Do you think we’ll ever see another craze like that or does that feel like a once in a generation kind of thing?

BILAL: It's definitely possible. A lot of different factors came into play: The stock market was going up at a tremendous rate, the government had put so much money in the economy, we hit a bottom and then skyrocketed in a very short period of time. It's hard to predict what will happen in the future, but it's possible, for sure. A lot of things have to happen for that to happen again.

LEVEL: Keep it a buck: Have either of you ever fell for a get-rich-quick scheme? A case where you jumped into something you thought was easy money and it just didn’t pan out?

BILAL: Not necessarily a get-rich-quick scheme, 'cause it's legitimate if you know what you're doing, but I lost a lot of money in crypto. It was new at the time and I rushed into it and didn't have a full understanding. You make some money and then you think it's a magical machine that's going to keep printing money for you. So even if something is legitimate, a lack of education can hurt you. Stocks, real estate, whatever. It's not even that it's a scam a lot of times. It's just that you don't have a full understanding of what you're doing. Treating it like gambling when you don't understand what you're doing, you’re going to lose your money most of the time.

MILLINGS: Yeah, the crypto space in late 2017 probably would probably be the best example. Like, we’re about to be millionaires in the next month.

LEVEL: I made some and lost a lot more in that. But how do you learn from those mistakes without getting discouraged altogether? Some people might take a loss on investment as more reason to revert to keeping money under the mattress.

BILAL: You become more careful, and vet things better. Have a higher level of understanding before you invest in things. Learn not to move off emotion. Once you’ve researched, you feel a lot more confident. It’s a different situation as opposed to rushing to try something spur of the moment.

LEVEL: How did you each develop your own foundational knowledge about finance?

BILAL: Since I was a little kid, I was always interested in money. Always interested in the stock market and business. So I just kept learning from a young age. Reading books like Rich Dad, Poor Dad helped a lot—I read that when I was 18—and different stock books, books about real estate, books about business. Starting a career as a financial advisor accelerated my growth even more. I did that for 12 years before doing this. So pretty much from 10 years old up until now, it's been just constantly learning about business and nurturing it.

MILLINGS: My journey started in adulthood because I'm rooted in education. We were trying to teach kids about finance—I gotta learn about it myself before I can teach it. Same thing we do now. I was fortunate to have him by my side for most of that journey. Rich Dad, Poor Dad was one of those pillars. I remember reading that the day after I got my undergrad [degree] and that just fascinated my mind. Every day I get up and read because I wanna know more.

LEVEL: Let’s talk about fatherhood. There’s this classic dilemma—one that was central to the Black-ish storyline—about growing up struggling, making enough money to live comfortably, and then trying to raise Black children who don’t take things for granted and understand what it took to

get there. Have you two thought about how that factors into your parenting style?

MILLINGS: It's something I quite haven't figured out yet. There is a dilemma there. I don't want to come from that adage, like, "I made it out the mud and so now my kids have to go back to the mud to figure it out themselves." Our kids are growing up with a safety net, but that's why we work hard. My thing is, you try to teach 'em lessons, teach 'em the value of hard work. You lead by example. You demonstrate what work ethic looks like. Hopefully they see that and it translates. So it's a challenge. Our kids have very high ambitions and aspirations and their wish lists of things keeps increasing as we keep becoming more successful. The other day, I told my daughter I got her a surprise. Her response was, “Daddy, did you buy a yacht?” I'm like, “What? No, I got you front-row tickets to see Mariah Carey.” She was like, “Oh. Well, can we still get the yacht?” [Laughs] Their concept of reality is just different, man. It’s learning in progress.

BILAL: I'm not really a traditional parent. I didn't grow up in a real strict environment. My mom bought me a lot of clothes, even if it wasn't the most responsible thing at that time. Playing basketball was my main focus. I just figured out what I wanted to do. For my son, it's the same thing. I don't wanna force too much unnecessary hardship on him, 'cause there's no need to. He'll be able to figure things out for himself. All I can do is give him guidance. I think he sees the example that's being set. It's up to him to see where he wants to take it. It's his life. It's too much pressure that parents put on themselves to make sure their children turn out a certain way. Who knows how this thing is going to work out? Whatever he wants to do with his life, I'm sure he'll make the right decision.

As far as trying to make him work for things, it's beneficial, but it is not necessarily reality. Some people's reality is different from other people's reality. It's impossible to make somebody

appreciate things they didn't have to work for—it was just given to them. That's crazy try to reverseengineer that. It's like having a prince understand what it's like to be a servant. The prince is never going to understand what it's like to be a servant, but the servant is never going to understand what it's like to be a prince either. Neither one is better than the other, it's just the circumstances that they were born with.

LEVEL: Sounds like your kids get the best of both worlds—the Nikes and the Nike stock.

MILLINGS: In terms of stocks, that's all year. We have custodial accounts for our kids. What we're doing now—especially with my children—is making them more aware of the money they have. They can look inside their accounts. They have debit cards. My eight-year-old son can go to a store and understand how you pay from his account. But they still enjoy simple things. He’s into toys, so I try to teach him the difference between a toy that can appreciate and [one that would] depreciate. This thing he wants is $170, but when you realize the rarity of it, I'm like, Here's a way to teach him. You let them be kids and still figure out what ways you can have learnable moments.

BILAL: My son, he's very similar to how I grew up as far as what he's into. He plays sports—looks like he's going to be a pretty good athlete. And he's into fashion, so he’s asking me for Gucci glasses. You can't run from it, 'cause it’s an environment we created. He watches me on Instagram going to Fashion Week and it's like, I want to do what he's doing. The fashion thing is becoming expensive— especially sneakers.

LEVEL: Lil Wayne ain't the only one stuntin’ like his daddy.

BILAL: I was actually just talking to my lawyer about estate planning or creating a trust and having him as one of the beneficiaries, structuring that, seeing how that looks. He might not be fully aware, but a lot is in place for him. Just gotta educate him. That's what we doing now—both investing for the kids but giving them some material stuff as well.

LEVEL: Speaking of establishing wills and trusts, at what point should people start getting serious about that? Is it after having a family, or beforehand?

see page 86

MILLINGS: I'm going to give him his flowers right now. I never thought about being older until [Rashad] sat down with me when I was 25 and said, “You need to get life insurance.” Most people at 25 are thinking, Why do I need life insurance? But the reality is we not going to be here forever. After sitting down with him, I was like, What happens when I have kids? When I'm married? I should prepare for that while I'm younger, healthier, and can afford to do it. That's where it started for me.

BILAL: Everybody's path is going to be different, but as early as possible. And you don’t have to do every single thing at one time. You could start with opening an IRA and putting money into a 401(k). Then get life insurance. Get a will. Get a trust. You don't have to do every single thing when you're 22 years old, but start to think on that level. As you start to make more, as your life changes, you're already in that position. That's vitally important as soon as you become an adult.

LEVEL: As you’ve moved into new spaces, how has racism factored in your journey? Or have you found that the only color that matters is green?

BILAL: There's different levels of racism. It's not necessarily people disrespecting us in our face, but there's differences you don't even pick up on. Like, a white person is doing a festival and they get $8 million in corporate funding and 30 different corporations funding their product. [Meanwhile], they don't even have a thousand people. And we do InvestFest and got 14,000 people and we struggling to get a few corporate sponsors. The only difference is one person's white, one person is black. That's a different level of discrimination that you really can't pinpoint.

But this is important 'cause it’s these budgets that's impacting people to have more jobs and economic empowerment. The more money we make, the more money we spend with other Black businesses. That creates a ripple effect. Stuff like that in deal structure and corporate budgets, for the most part that's what we see. Not necessarily racist people in your face like it's 1950. That could still happen as well, but it's more so on a higher level.

MILLINGS: There's more barriers the higher

we go. From a personal standpoint, being in the real estate world and having the appraisal process go wrong. Now I see the news covering times where Black home ownership gets devalued when they realize who owns the home. So at every level, you are going to face something. But it goes back to what did we learn and how do we maneuver around this? We're breaking barriers every time we go somewhere, because we're setting a new standard.

LEVEL: Does it ever affect you in a discouraging way, or do you just keep it moving?

BILAL: What's your alternative? If you Black from America, you already know the odds is stacked against you. So we’re used to that. My guy Derrick Faulcon always say, “If you Black, you gotta go outside with an umbrella even if it's sunny, 'cause anything can happen.”

We gotta make the best out of the situations we have in front of us. We've been able to do that. But it could be worse. No matter how hard it is for us now, it's still a blessing to be alive at this point in time and to be in this country. America—there's so much opportunity. There's a lot of things wrong with this country, but it's still probably the most opportunity that you have in this world. [The fact that] we can start a company in a couple of years and rise to the level we're at right now speaks to that. We play the cards that we dealt and don't complain about it.

LEVEL: I loved seeing Rashad chime in on the $500,000 vs. dinner with Jay-Z debate that pops up on social media every few months. Your take was about how for someone in your position the meeting could be more valuable than the money.

BILAL: The conversation is interesting because most people only look at it at face value. Obviously everybody's situation is different, but what I'm getting from that is how most people value things. The average person, their number-one goal in meeting Jay-Z or a billionaire is to take a picture. What I'm trying to say is you should always be prepared to meet somebody that can change

your life. Because at some point, you're going to meet somebody that's going to change your life. Especially if you live in a city like Atlanta or New York. You could walk outside in L.A. and run into Tyler Perry at Roscoe's. It happens—but

Make yourself valuable because people ultimately can push you further than money can. Rich and very wealthy people understand that, that's why they cultivate relationships, pay to get in rooms, and donate money to politicians.

LEVEL: Are you familiar with the hashtag #LLCTwitter?

BILAL: I know exactly what you're talking about. It’s where people make jokes about financial literacy. Like, everybody's an expert.

LEVEL: Yeah, but I believe it started due to some people offering sketchy and often condescending financial advice on Twitter and Clubhouse during the early days of the pandemic.

are you prepared? Do you have an elevator pitch? Most people waste that moment.

Big Sean's a perfect example: He meets Kanye and he just starts rapping to him while he's actually walking. After 10 minutes, Kanye takes a liking to him. The rest is history. What if he would've wasted that opportunity just to take a picture. Now what's more valuable in that situation, $500,000 or meeting Kanye West? I'm sure he made a lot more than $500,000 throughout that whole situation. That's the whole point, to get people to think bigger. Relationships are the most valuable commodity that we have. Relationships are worth more than money. And you see that at the highest level. This is why people go golfing for eight hours, because they get a chance to talk and network. These conversations can spark billion-dollar ideas, billiondollar brands. We have to understand, value, and cultivate relationships more.

The goal is to work to become as valuable as you possibly can so you have something to offer. It doesn't have to be a celebrity. It could be your local real estate developer who's making a killing. When we met Steve Harvey, that helped change our lives, but that was because we had value-add already. We had to work to build up that value-add.

BILAL: Yeah, during the pandemic, financial literacy was at a premium. Whenever something's at a premium, it opens the floodgates to every person that wants to be in the space. Some people are qualified; some are not. That's going to happen with anything. There's a million people that have the best diet plan, the best workout plan, the best idea for reparations. Everybody's going to have their own opinion. The good and bad thing about social media is anybody can have a platform. There's no qualifications to be able to speak.

MILLINGS: The reality is everybody's financial health is going to be determined by them. You can get information but ultimately you have to make your own decision. There’s no guarantees in investments. We can take advice. We can take information. But when we do our own research and break down our own values and goals, that's when we ultimately have to figure out where we're going with our financial situation.

BILAL: I see the jokes every once in a while. Comedy's always—it's always lighthearted. But we have to be careful. Look at black empowerment during the '90s: Every skit turned masculine Black men into a joke. In Living Color, all of these shows. Looking back on it, you made it a joke to be a positive Black man. And what's the alternative, to be a negative Black man? We don't understand what we are doing. That's actually extremely detrimental because the people that's trying to enlighten us, we’re making them a caricature, a laughing stock. So now nobody wants to fill that

see page 88

role anymore because they're embarrassed. By embarrassing one person, you have to uplift another. So you embarrassing one end of the spectrum, but then that's when gangster rap got uplifted. And you see a rise in gang culture, a rise in violence. Songs like "Unity" and "Fight the Power" decrease and other influences start to increase.

Financial literacy is trendy right now and it's important to fact-check information, but we don't wanna follow that same blueprint where everything is a joke. 'Cause then you go back into the same habits that you were in before. You start spending money frivolously thinking, "Investing is a joke. Having a business is a joke." But it's like, nah, that's really not funny. So we have to be careful with how we use comedy 'cause it shapes the way we perceive things.

LEVEL: What are some of the economic or financial trends you’re watching for 2023?

BILAL: AI is very interesting. I learned a few things this week about artificial intelligence. I’m going to do a lot more research on that. And then monitoring Web 3.0, seeing where we're headed with the metaverse. A lot of people are not talking about that right now, but it doesn't mean it's dead. There's still opportunity there.

MILLINGS: The general economy—the recessionary environment, how long is that going to last? China reopening, what does that mean for the global economy semiconductor? Supply chain issues. The infrastructure bill getting passed. The EV space. There's so much, man. We always have something to talk about because something new happens every day, especially in economics and finance.

LEVEL: When it’s all said and done, how far do you think you can take Earn Your Leisure and what do you want its legacy to be?

BILAL: Global reach, global empowerment, global brand of financial literacy and business. Taking the company public and becoming a household name. Being a trusted source. And

establishing one of the top media brands in the world.

MILLINGS: We're setting ourselves up nicely to make sure that we fulfill that promise. And the beauty is people get to watch it. They got to watch us on our iPhones in 2019 to us in Nigeria in 2021 to us in the UAE in 2022. Get ready for 2023.

BILAL: You’ll see more global efforts in Europe, Africa, Asia, the UAE. And expanding the diversity of content. You might see a movie, you might see a book, a show that we produce about travel or cooking. Becoming more diverse with our portfolio of our offerings. It's a lot that we have planned.

MILLINGS: Look at Disney. Look at Turner Broadcasting. [These are] legacy brands that's 50, 100 years old with different CEOs and people that have different visions taking it to different levels. That's it right there, man. Legacy brand. It’s like what Denzel said [in American Gangster]. Earn Your Leisure—if they know that, even if they don’t know us, that's how you really can really quantify the impact.

https://www.levelman.com/earn-your-leisure-themaking-of-a-financial-education-empire/ Image credit: Black Enterprise, akiddfromnewhaven.com, blackenterprise.com, thereformedbroker.com, Trademark

From left to right Troy Millings, Steve Harvey, Rashad Bilal

Monique Woodard Takes Her 'Layered' Investment Approach to a New Level with $17M Fund

By Josh Rodgers

FOUNDING PARTNER AND “HEAD BAKER”

Monique Woodard is doing her part to ensure that business owners can have their cake and eat it too.

In a Twitter post, Woodard announced Cake Ventures Fund I

“I’m officially announcing Cake Ventures (@ cakeventures) Fund I, a $17M seed and pre-seed fund to invest in founders building companies and products whose growth is accelerated by demographic change,” the tweet read.

According to a report from Forbes, Woodard closed on the first part of her fund in March 2021.

Since its initial launch, she has had an interest in newly formed businesses that drive demographic changes through “layers of a cake,” which include:

 aging and longevity-minded population

 the increased earning power of women in society

 the shift to “majority-minority”

This demographic, layered approach is a thesis Woodard explained that she does not believe exists at other firms.

“It’s the lens through which I view companies,” Woodard told Forbes in an interview. “Even companies that don’t ‘look like’ demographic change companies on the surface have a layer of this under the hood.”

With the fund in place, Cake Ventures will target approximately 25 investments at about $500,000 per check. The firm has made 12 investments in companies like training startup Bright, household bills tracking platform Gerald, and neurodivergence support business Joshin. Forty percent of Cake Ventures’ portfolio includes businesses led by women.

Bank of America, Foundry Group, Gates’ Pivotal Ventures, Plexo Capital, and Cendana Ventures back the new fund. Woodard admitted that raising money for the fund was a challenge. The Forbes report also noted that Woodard originally had plans to raise $20 million.

“I’ve said before that raising a fund is doing venture capital on hard mode. And raising a fund as a woman is like crawling through glass, and raising a fund as a Black woman is like crawling through glass with no clothes on, and then they pour fire ants all over you,” she said to Forbes. “So it was always going to be hard.”

https://afrotech.com/cake-ventures-17m-fund

Image credit: bizjournals.com

RENOWNED FILMMAKER SPIKE LEE and premier talent agency, The Gersh Agency have announced the launch of the Spike Fellows Program.

This fellowship will assist students at the three historically Black colleges and universities, Morehouse College, Spelman College and Clark Atlanta University, which comprise the Atlanta University Center Consortium.

Lee expressed his tremendous admiration for the HBCU experience in an interview he gave to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution back in 2012.

“Being taught by African American faculty, people really took a deep interest in educating and one of the things I learned at an early age was the importance of education,” said the prideful “Morehouse Man,” according to Essence.

After earning his Bachelor of Arts in Mass Communication from Clark College and completing several classes at Spelman College, Lee (Class of ’79) has decided that his life’s work will consist of helping others achieve their educational potential.

“It is with great honor, privilege, and excitement to announce the Spike Fellows in association with my partners The Gersh Agency and the AUCC. From the jump, from the get-go, I knew when (not

Spike Lee and Gersh Establish Fellowship Program for HBCU Film Students

By Evie B.

if) I opened a crack in the door, I was bringing as many Black and brown folks with me in front and behind the camera,” Lee said in a news release on Thursday.

Lee has been a constant advocate for the development of minority educational institutions and has championed the significance of HBCUs on and off the screen. The importance of historically Black colleges and universities to him stems from the fact that he comes from a long line of alums.

“I know firsthand the education one receives at a Historically Black College and University,” Lee noted. “I am who I am because of my grandmother [Zimmie Jackson] and my mother [Jacquelyn Shelton Lee], who both graduated from Spelman College. I am who I am because of my grandfather [Richard Jackson Shelton] and my father [William Lee], who both graduated from Morehouse. It’s on the campuses of Spelman and Morehouse where they met, fell in love and got married. As my elders often told me, ‘Deeds not words.’”

Gersh, much like Lee, has a history of getting behind social causes, both as a company and on behalf of its clients.

“As industry leaders, we’ve always taken seriously the responsibility to build a more diverse, dynamic

Spike Lee Photo Credit: Eamonn M. McCormack

Idris Elba is Planning to Open a Film Studio in Tanzania

By Francis Akhalbey (Edited)

A PRESIDENTIAL AIDE in Tanzania has announced that award-winning British actor Idris Elba is interested in opening a film studio in the East African nation. According to the BBC, the aide said this comes after Elba and President Samia Suluhu Hassan held preliminary talks.

Elba and President Hassan met at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in January (see pages 22, 24). “The president met with Idris Elba and his wife Sabrina, they are keen to invest in a film studio in Tanzania. The talks are in the initial stage but if everything goes well then the studio will benefit not only Tanzania but east and central Africa,” Zuhura Yunus, who is the director of presidential communications, said.

President Hassan was sworn into office after the death of her predecessor John Magufuli. She has

ecosystem in which people of all ethnicities, backgrounds and experiences can thrive,” Gersh Senior Managing Partner Leslie Siebert said in the statement.

“We are honored that Spike has chosen us to be his inaugural partner, and we are proud to welcome the five inaugural Spike Fellows into our organization,” Siebert continued.

The Spike Fellows Program is founded on the idea that possibilities will arise as a result of visibility and accessibility. Five AUCC graduates will make up the first class of Spike Fellows. Gersh will provide school debt remission, industry mentorship, postgraduate internships and full-time employment for this group.

Gersh’s Head of Culture, Jayson Council, will oversee the Fellowship program.

since spearheaded multiple initiatives in foreign policy, business, trade, and investment.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/movies/news/ idris-elba-is-planning-to-open-a-film-studio-intanzania/ar-AA16ZGdL

Image credit: standardmedia.co.ke

“I joined Gersh to lead the charge in identifying powerful opportunities and signature moments to advance cultural competence and accelerate social impact,” Council shared. “As an HBCU graduate, I am extremely proud of Gersh and Spike for their commitment to growing opportunities for AUCC graduates.”

A panel composed of Spike Lee, the AUCC community, and Gersh management will choose the five fellows for the program, which will launch in January 2023. The program will be expanded in the future with more funding and fellows as Lee and Gersh have committed to a multi-year commitment.

https://blavity.com/spike-lee-gersh-establish-fellowshipprogram-hbcu-students

Image credit: prnewswire.com

British actor Idris Elba and his wife Sabrina pose with Tanzanian president Samia Suhulu (Courtesy)

Tumblr Launches New Livestreaming Feature

By Ryan O'Rourke

SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM

Tumblr is entering the livestreaming market with a new feature dubbed Tumblr Live. The new feature comes via the video streaming service Live Box and will give Tumblr a native streaming presence to compete with the likes of Twitter and Facebook. Users in the U.S. on Android and iOS are able to access Tumblr Live now with a desktop and global rollout coming soon.

Previously, Tumblr had no native means of allowing viewers to livestream, only allowing them to link to other existing platforms like YouTube. Tumblr Live will instead keep its creators on-site, allowing them to go live directly from the app and eventually the website. The user interface looks very similar to the typical livestreamer with a trending page for popular creators and the ability to save your favorite creators on the site. Monetization for creating content on the site exists in the form of Diamonds which users can donate to streamers to support their work. Live Box will handle most of the moderation through both AI and manual review for any content that violates site policy, though individual creators can also appoint their own moderators.

Currently, the ability to livestream is only available through a user's primary account and not any side blogs.

Teaming with Live Box indicates a seriousness from Tumblr in growing a creator economy. The blogging site has largely been a haven for artists and other creatives, opening another avenue for them to grow on the platform and make a little money. "We’re curious to see how Tumblr’s overflowing creativity will blossom now that users have access to native livestreaming," Matt Mullenweg, founder and CEO of Tumblr parent company Automattic, said in a statement. "Our creators are multi-modal and this is a new color in their palette." Automattic bought the site from Verizon back in 2019 as a sort of companion to WordPress, but the addition of livestreaming gives Tumblr a new dimension.

Tumblr Senses an Opportunity to Regain Ground On Its Competitors

It's no surprise that Tumblr is adding livestreaming capabilities now considering what's happening in the wider social media landscape. Twitter has largely descended into

chaos under its new CEO Elon Musk following a string of wildly unpopular announcements. Musk has looked to monetize the blue verified checkmark, reinstate controversial figures on the platform, suspend and ban users under questionable circumstances, and briefly enact policy changes that have kneecapped users' abilities to promote their businesses and other platforms, among other things, leading many users to consider a move to another site. Tumblr could be one such beneficiary of the chaos and adding livestreaming further diversifies their offering.

Expectations for Tumblr Live aren't to beat out Twitch or other established livestreamers, but it's another tool in the site's kit as Automattic tries to right the ship. The full list of details on Tumblr Live can be viewed in a blog post from the site. More information will come out on a global rollout soon.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/ news/technology/tumblrlaunches-new-livestreamingfeature/ar-AA15utqy

BIPOC Creators to Launch Twitter Alternative ‘Spill’ for Black, Overlooked ‘Culture Drivers’

By Stacy Jackson

SOCIAL MEDIA users who have previously tweeted their thoughts online may be flying away to new apps.

Two former Twitter employees announced their new Spill app, a new social platform structured as an alternative to Twitter, to offer Black Twitter users a new space for trendsetters and culture drivers.

According to Insider, the two creators are Alphonzo “Phonz” Terrell and DeVaris Brown, who described the platform, which is named for the phrase “spill the tea,” as “a real-time conversational platform that puts culture first.”

“While Spill is for everyone, we are catering to culture drivers who frequently set new trends yet routinely get overlooked and under compensated,” Terrell, who formerly served as Twitter’s global head of social and editorial for three years, tweeted in an announcement about the app. “Yes, we mean Black creators, Queer creators, and a variety of influential voices outside the U.S.”

“Even before I left Twitter, over the last several months, I was just talking to Black female creators, talking to Black queer creators and I’m like, ‘How do you make your money? Is any platform supporting you? Does the idea of Spill interest you?'” Terrell told TechCrunch.

“It’s not a web3 thing,” Terrell said. “But the use of blockchain is for both crediting creators and setting up a model for us to compensate them automatically. If they have a spill that goes viral and we monetize it, it’s really effective.”

According to TechCrunch, the duo bonded over the commonality of being Black employees at Twitter, and with a common vision, they sought to curate a space for Black creators to be highlighted for their influential contributions.

“We’re going to be more intentional and be more accurate around things that will be deemed offensive, because, again, this is our lived experience or learned experience,” Brown, who worked on machine learning as a product manager lead at Twitter said. “It’ll be much more accurate to catch those kinds of things that will detract from the platform that would not lend to creating a safe space for our users and our creators.”

Terrell tweeted his thanks to those who have already supported Spill so far.

Reportedly, the app will be launching in January 2023.

https://www.blackenterprise. com/twitter-alternative-spill-tolaunch-in-january-as-a-refugefor-black-users/

Reserve your handle now, share this page and follow our founders for the latest

(Image: (L-R) DeVaris Brown/LinkedIn/Screenshot; Alphonzo "Phonz" Terrell/spill-app.com/Screenshot)

The Biggest Tech Trends of 2023, According to Over 40 Ex

By Mark Sullivan

The DAWN team provides an abbreviated version of the article below - read the full article at: https://www.fastcompany.com/90827380/the-biggest-tech-trends-of-2023-according-to-over-40-experts

AGAIN THIS YEAR, I opened my Rolodex looking for the smartest and best-placed people in and around the tech industry to offer their 2023 predictions. I asked startup founders, Big Tech execs, VCs, scholars, and other experts to speculate on the coming year within their field of interest. In all, we collected more than 40 predictions about 2023. Together, they offer a smart composite look at the things we’re likely to be talking about by this time next year.

AI AND ROBOTICS

Andrew Feldman, CEO and cofounder, Cerebras Systems

I believe generative AI is underhyped, not overhyped. With this technology, the problems of translating from any language, to any other language, will be completely solved. We’re going to be unable to tell the difference between humangenerated content and AI-produced content— across written content, video, digital art, and more. We see the AI market growing exponentially, and in 2023, we expect to see an AI company passing $50 billion in valuation.

Lama Nachman, director of intelligent systems research lab, Intel Labs

Next year, I believe there will be more focus

on progressing generative AI, advancing human/ AI collaboration and responsibly developing AI technologies so they do not marginalize people, use data in unethical ways or discriminate against different populations. As thousands of companies across all industries continue to make AI breakthroughs, 2023 will be a foundational year for the industry to collaborate and transparently share learnings to mitigate risk and further drive innovation.

Diego Pantoja-Navajas, VP, AWS Supply Chain

We are looking forward to better, more predictive supply chains that can anticipate what customer demand cycles will be, as well as anticipating what likely supply chain risks will be and ways to overcome them. Advances in AI and machine learning move quickly, and we believe that supply chains will benefit from these developments in a very significant way in the coming years.

Ken Washington, VP & GM, Consumer Robotics, Amazon

In 2023, robots will evolve to play a more important and useful role in our homes and businesses. They will develop the ability to have more sophisticated interactions with humans thanks to enormous advancements in AI and machine learning, such as breakthrough multimodal abilities that enable robots to learn new things similarly to how we as humans learn. They will perform useful tasks, entertain, and provide companionship to their owners.

VIRTUAL SPACES

Hari Vasudev, SVP, Retail Tech Platforms and country head, Walmart Global Tech

AR/VR will be a gamechanger in bringing personalized experiences, such as virtual try-ons for apparel, eyewear, or even scanning shelves to

find items that match one’s lifestyle and diet. Over a period of time, voice technology will emerge as a natural part of one’s shopping experience and an important tool for retailers to reduce customer friction.

Jeremy King, SVP Engineering, Pinterest

[B]rands need to invest further in building out their AR technology capabilities to ensure they are set up to be inclusive of all audiences. It’s no longer enough to just offer one AR powered filter per item; instead brands will need to ensure that their filters are tailored for a diverse group of consumers from the outset. Consumers are not going to scroll through a list of filters to find the one that best matches their individuality.

CRYPTO AND WEB3

Lindsey Li, investor, Bessemer Venture Partners

Ethereum will maintain dominance of developer mindshare as Ethereum Virtual Machines (EVMs) continue to drive network effects amongst builders. We will also continue to see fallout from ecosystems with FTX involvement but this will not deter more alt Layer 1s from cropping up, cycling in and out of favor. We predict these trend cycles will get shorter as new L1s will not have access to the capital of bull markets past, thereby minimizing the size of potential ecosystem funds and marketing budgets previously used to attract tourists to the next shiny thing.

Kendrick Nguyen, cofounder and CEO, Republic

Tokenization will transform the relationship between companies and their communities. It will become the norm for companies of all shapes and sizes—not just “Web3 companies”—to offer their communities of customers, fans, and supporters upside in their growth via a token issuance.

Tokenization unlocks retail participation in private markets via liquidity, fractionalization, quick settlement, and transparency, which benefits both sides of the transaction.

SECURITY

Tim Guleri, managing director, Sierra Ventures

Cyber criminals are feasting on the reactive way in which our most important applications are protected when they run on cloud infrastructure. As application workloads continue to move into the cloud and also from cloud to the edge, realtime cloud-native Application Protection software will become a requirement to thwart the rise in sophisticated and costly attacks by cyber criminals.

Leyla Bilge, technical director, Norton Labs

In 2023, we expect to see cyber criminals use advanced forms of AI technology, such as programs like DALL-E, Midjourney, and Stable Diffusion, or AI chatbots like ChatGPT to boost the effectiveness of their scams. These programs are accessible and easy to use, so cybercriminals can quickly create realistic images that add more depth and human touch to their scam. However, existing AI solutions are not perfect or foolproof, and it’s possible to be able to detect when they are used in attacks and scams.

Sharon Mandell, chief information officer, Juniper Networks

As organizations transition toward hybrid cloud models, companies still need to spend on tools to keep their existing infrastructure running the way it is—and avoid security pitfalls mid-migration. At the same time, there is a ton of pressure to satisfy government edicts for security as well as keep up resilience in the face of more ransomware. In 2023, CIOs will be forced to make this journey as cost-effective as possible by ramping up efforts to educate the biggest security vulnerability they have: their employees.

STARTUPS AND INVESTING

Mark Surman, executive director, Mozilla

[T]he last economic downturn produced a whole new crop of successful tech companies, like Uber and AirBNB. We should all be asking: what kind

see page 96

Tech Trends 2023 from page 95

of companies are likely to thrive in this downturn?

We’re seeing a lot of founders taking a fresh spin on empowering users (think Firefox or Signal, but for the AI era). These companies have a real chance to grow over the next couple of years, which could in turn define the next decade of tech.

Dustin Robinson, cofounder and managing principal, Iter Investments (a psychedelics venture capital firm)

We are currently in a mental health crisis, and the current pharmaceuticals aren’t doing the trick. Meanwhile, there’s been an explosion of companies developing virtual reality programs to serve mental health. These fully immersive experiences have the potential to create a transcendent experience and allow people to overcome various mental health indications.

HYBRID WORK

Nicole Herskowitz, VP of Microsoft Teams, Microsoft

Over the last two years, innovation in workplace technology has taken-off at light speed, with no signs of slowing down. Now more than ever we are seeing new patterns of work emerging that are asynchronous, interactive, and intelligent. My prediction for 2023 is that we will see more workplace tools span the full spectrum of work styles and take advantage of the convergence of productivity, collaboration, data, AI, business process, and work flow automation.

Noah Weiss, chief product officer, Slack

In 2023, organizations will find new ways to continue fostering the best parts of the old office, like candid conversations over coffee, while taking advantage of asynchronous tools and new digitally native forms of coworking. This will be the year we work together effectively, no matter where we are or when we’re working, while building teams that feel connected, inclusive, and agile.

Howie Liu, cofounder and CEO, Airtable

As every organization needs to move faster to meet customer demands, knowledge work is getting more fractured. Companies need a way to unify their teams and connect their data, enabling people to work autonomously, yet in coordinated

fashion. We see a problem within enterprises where it’s not enough to just have individual apps. Individual apps need to be connected and allow the entire enterprise to share a source of truth.

Cynthia Stoddard, SVP and CIO, Adobe

[A] priority area for CIOs is creating digital-first employee experiences for the hybrid workplace. My team works diligently to develop and deploy the right environments, tools, and processes that enable employees to be productive and do their best work— from anywhere. As digital becomes the default, experimentation and investment are needed to explore cutting edge-technology and test collaborative workplace tools with a holistic and human-centered experience in mind.

ENERGY

Mariona Company, global head of sustainable packaging, HP

Sustainable manufacturing strategies will reach a tipping point in 2023. Winning in today’s market, where 77% of consumers say they would stop buying products from a company that had been found guilty of greenwashing, requires more action and less talk than ever before. Companies will need to rethink the way they make, deliver, and use products, as well as their packaging.

Neal Hansch, CEO and managing partner, Silicon Foundry

In conjunction with the ongoing and everincreasing adoption of electric powered vehicles, it’s important to emphasize that the charging infrastructure required to support these vehicles must continue to roll out at a rapid pace in parallel . . . designed to accommodate homes, corporate campuses, gas stations, highway stops, and more. Solutions to meet this demand continue to flow from both the energy majors, as well as pure play startups alike.

Zipporah “Zip” Allen, CMO, Strava

An active community inspires cities to invest in infrastructure and our trends in exercise, commutes, and other activity patterns ultimately

impact city planning. We’re predicting a continued surge in e-bike usage similar to this year’s 26% increase compared to last year. The trend lines indicate that conscious and intentional movement is here to stay. With more people opting into human powered movement, it will lead to better outcomes for individuals and communities collectively.

CREATOR ECONOMY

Sam Yam, cofounder, president, and CTO, Patreon

Creators are seeing how quickly trends are emerging and fading, and these rapid cycles will only continue to condense in 2023 as our collective attention span continues to shrink (with short-form TikToks, IG Reels, and YouTube Shorts!). During [the pandemic], we saw genres like crypto surge to over 100% earnings growth over two months, only to see that growth disappear within the next few months. Creators are so innovative, though, that they’re usually the first to surface these trends and shape the culture around them.

Marija Radulovic-Nastic, CTO, creative and development, Electronic Arts

[The] combination of AI and human creativity can give us quality and quantity far better/bigger than humans alone can do. For me, 2023 is going to be all about generative AI empowering the creatives to create faster and we will continue to see even more adoption of this technology, which will significantly impact the future of how content is created.

HEALTH AND WEARABLES

Sean Duff y, CEO and cofounder, Omada Health

As both patients and providers face broader financial constraints in 2023, and the cost of doctor visits, medications, and treatments skyrocket, it’s imperative that technology helps people simplify their long-term health choices and save money. Virtual care will become the bridge that allows people to not have to choose between paying for gas and paying for a doctor’s visit or medication.

Liana Douillet Guzman, CEO, FOLX Health

First, if the last few weeks are any indication, we’ll see ChatGPT continue to build incredible momentum. I’m excited by the potential this technology has for expanding access to equitable care, but we need to learn from the mistakes made with social media to ensure we are taking an ethical and thoughtful approach to creating virtual dialogue.

Gabriel

Mecklenberg, cofounder, Hinge Health

[As] we look ahead to 2023, equitable healthcare access means that AI-powered care experiences must work on low-end phones, for people of all shapes and colors, and in everyday environments. We must ensure AI is used to bridge the care gap, not widen it.

TECH REGULATION

Marisa Tricarico, North America lead for Responsible AI, Accenture

We’ll be talking about more Responsible AI and AI regulation in 2023. Despite perceptions that it might stifle innovation, AI regulation provides organizations with clarity about the boundaries, so they can push innovation to the limit without destroying hard-earned trust built with their customers, shareholders and society at large. And companies are already preparing: Accenture’s latest research surveying 850 global executives found almost half of businesses (45%) plan to commit at least a fifth of their AI budgets to meeting regulatory requirements by 2024.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90827380/thebiggest-tech-trends-of-2023-according-to-over40-experts

Image credit: miton.cz, paymentscardsandmobile. com, innovaprimarycare.com

NASA Postdoctoral Program Seeks Early Career and Senior Scientists for Prestigious Fellowships at its Locations Across the U.S.

From AFRO News

NASA INVITES BOTH early-career and senior scientists to explore fellowship opportunities in its postdoctoral program and share in NASA’s mission to develop advancements in science, technology, aeronautics and space exploration. The deadline to apply for this cycle of fellowships is March 1, 2023. Learn more or apply for fellowships in the NASA Postdoctoral Program (NPP). ORAU manages the NPP for NASA.

“The NPP includes diverse scientific and technological fellowships offered at NASA and one-of-a-kind educational experiences that prepare future leaders for NASA and the academic community,” said ORAU NPP Program Director J. Scott Miller, Ph.D. “ORAU supports NASA’s goal to build an inclusive, collaborative, open, and innovative work environment that enhances work-life balance and encourages career development for postdoctoral fellows.”

This program offers unique research opportunities for highlytalented U.S. and non-U.S. scientists to engage in ongoing NASA research projects with top scientists at a NASA Center, NASA Headquarters or at a NASA-affiliated research institute. These one- to three-year fellowships are competitive and are designed to advance NASA’s missions in space science, earth science, aeronautics, space operations, exploration systems and astrobiology.

Eligibility

Scientists within five years of having received their degrees are eligible to apply as a postdoctoral fellow; scientists who have received their doctorates more than five years previously may apply as a senior fellow. After the first year as a postdoctoral fellow, scientists interested in management may apply to the postdoctoral management program at NASA Headquarters. NASA has re-opened eligibility to foreign nationals who are eligible for the Exchange Visitor J-1 visa status. See eligibility and requirements for more details.

Benefits

Stipend rates for these NASA postdoctoral fellows currently start at $70,000 per year. Supplements are provided for higher cost-of-living areas and certain academic specialties. The stipend amount for a senior postdoctoral fellow is based on the location of the appointment, experience (number of years beyond the doctoral degree) and career achievement, including academic rank and professional title. Available benefits include health insurance supplements, professional development resources, a research allowance up to $10,000 per year and relocation reimbursement.

Learn More and Apply

Learn more at https://npp.orau. org or email npp@orau.org.

https://afro.com/press-roomnasa-postdoctoral-programseeks-early-career-and-seniorscientists-for-prestigiousfellowships-at-its-locationsacross-the-u-s/

STARR ANDREWS WON a medal at the U.S. figure skating championships Friday, January 27th in San Jose, California, becoming the first Black woman to do so in over three decades

Andrews, who took fourth overall, was thrilled to share the podium with champion Isabeau Levito, second-place winner Bradie Tennell and bronze medalist Amber Glenn. She finished with 188.24 total for the two days of the competition, including a free skate score of 119.27, according to The Washington Post.

She fully understood significance of her pewter medal victory. Andrews was well aware that Debi Thomas’ victory — in 1988, 35 years ago — marked the last time a Black woman won a medal at a national competition in the United States. As a kid growing up in Los Angeles, Andrews was enmeshed in a

Starr Andrews Becomes First Black Woman to Medal at U.S. Figure Skating Championships

in more than Three Decades

By TheGrio Staff

sport where women of color hardly ever made it to the medal podium.

“To be able to be the next African American woman to stand on a podium is amazing,” Andrews said, according to The Post.

Considering the jumps she had missed and her blades that stuck in the ice, the 21-yearold was in awe of what she had accomplished.

Andrews, who took home a silver medal from Skate Canada in October, came in third in the U.S. nationals’ short program on Thursday and was confident she would earn a medal.

She was chosen as the first alternate for the American women’s team for the world figure skating championships in Saitama, Japan, set for March, after competing in Friday’s free skate, right behind Levito, Tennell and Glenn.

“It’s never going to be an easy road [in skating],” Andrews said, The Post reported. “There’s ups and downs, and … you have to take and make the best out of it. That’s how you become a great athlete, and [it]

helps you in regular life as well.”

Andrews praised her mother, Toshawa, a skater who has been her coach and mentor. She has a heart condition called microvascular disease, which her daughter said has caused 12 heart attacks, and also has had a stroke.

Andrews herself has suffered injuries and a heart condition that required surgery last November. Although her heart condition is not as critical as her mother’s, she will need another procedure soon and hopes that the speedy recovery and minimal surgery won’t cause too much of a disruption to her ice skating.

She revels in the letters she gets from the parents of young Black skaters telling her how much of an influence she is on their kids.

“I can’t believe I’m the person they saw, I’m the person that wanted to make them start skating,” Andrews said, The Post reported. “And I think that that’s so amazing. And I’m so glad that I can be that person..

https://thegrio.com/2023/01/30/ starr-andrews-first-blackwoman-win-medal-us-figureskating-championships/ Image credit: Ezra Shaw

Viola Davis, Beyoncé Make History at 2023 Grammys

By TheGrio Staff, Alex Fisher and The AP

▲ Viola Davis accepts the Audio Book, Narration and Storytelling Recording award for Finding Me during the 65th GRAMMY Awards Premiere Ceremony at Microsoft Theater on February 05, 2023 in Los Angeles, California.

Viola Davis Reaches

EGOT Status with First Grammy Win

Davis becomes the third Black woman in history to win an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Award.

VIOLA DAVIS WON her first career Grammy Award, making her the latest artist to achieve EGOT status.

Davis won the Grammy for Best Audiobook, Narration, and Storytelling Recording for the audiobook version of her 2022 memoir, “Finding Me.” With this win, she joined an elite club of artists who have won Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Awards.

“I wrote this book to honor the 6-year-old Viola,” Davis said during her acceptance speech. “To honor her life, her joy, her trauma, everything. And

it has been such a journey. I just EGOT!” She thanks book publisher Harper Collins and “everybody who was a part of my story.”

Davis concluded her speech by thanking her husband Julius and their daughter Genesis, calling them “the best chapter in my book.”

The Grammy win makes Davis the third Black female to be an EGOT, following Whoopi Goldberg and Jennifer Hudson, according to NBC News. Before Davis, Hudson was the latest to get an EGOT when she won her first Tony Award in 2022, when the Broadway musical “A Strange Loop,” for which she was a producer, won Best Musical.

Davis won a 2015 Emmy for her role in ABC’s “How to Get Away With Murder,” a 2017 Oscar for “Fences” and has two Tony wins for 2001’s “King Hedley II” and 2010’s “Fences.” She is also only the fourth Black artist to win a competitive EGOT. John Legend achieved an EGOT in 2018 when he won an Emmy for producing ABC’s “Jesus Christ Superstar: Live in Concert,” in the Outstanding Variety Special (Live) category.

https://thegrio.com/2023/02/05/ viola-davis-reaches-egot-statuswith-first-grammywin/

(Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)

Vi l D i t th A di B k N ti d St t lli

◄ Beyonce's 2023 Grammys

Entrance was Glamorous — And Unexpected © Provided by The Zoe Report

Beyoncé Broke Grammys Record

BEYONCÉ MADE HISTORY

at the Grammys Sunday,

February 5th, when she became the most decorated artist in the award show's history. Beyoncé climbed to the top with her 32nd career win for best dance/electronic music album for “Renaissance," breaking a record set in 1997 set by classical conductor Georg Solti

Solti held that Grammys record for more than two decades -- until Sunday.

“I’m trying not to be too emotional, I’m trying to just receive this night,” Beyoncé said, holding her 32nd Grammy.

After thanking her family, she expressed thanks to "the queer community for your love and for inventing the genre.”

Beyoncé's first win came in 2001, when Destiny's Child won two Grammys.

Eighty-eight career nominations have led to 32 Grammys so far. Her first nomination was in 2000, her first two wins a year later.

Three wins — the first three — were as a member of Destiny’s Child.

Twenty-nine were as a solo artist or collaborator with other artists, including Stevie Wonder, Luther Vandross, Megan Thee Stallion and her daughter Blue Ivy Carter.

Four wins were for best R&B song. Four more were for best R&B performance by a duo or group.

Three wins were for best contemporary R&B album. Three more were for best traditional R&B performance.

One win was for song of the year, her only Grammy in any of the so-called big four categories. (Edited)

https://www.msn.com/en-us/music/news/grammys-recordbeyonc%C3%A9-broke-was-held-for-years-by-chicago-symphonyorchestra-alum/ar-AA17aG6t

Rev. William Barber II to Head Yale Divinity Sch

By Niko

REV. WILLIAM BARBER II will lead the Yale Divinity School’s Center for Public Theology and Public Policy, according to Religious News Service. The reverend will teach his first class at Yale in January 2022.

Barber made the announcement Monday along with the news that he was retiring from Greenleaf Christian Church in Goldsboro, North Carolina. The 59-year-old reverend has been with the church for 30 years. Barber posted the news on Twitter with a caption

Barber also noted that the Center for Public

Theology and Public Policy at Yale has the goal of preparing a new generation to become moral leaders. He added that the new Yale center would incorporate history and activism into the program as well as partner with HBCUs to “build pathways for students to engage in our work.”

“THE GOAL OF THIS CENTER WILL BE TO PREPARE A NEW GENERATION — WHAT WE CALL MORAL FUSION LEADERS — THAT ARE GOING TO BE ACTIVE IN CREATING A JUST SOCIETY BOTH IN THE ACADEMY AND IN THE STREETS,” HE WROTE.

The Rev. William Barber II, center, flanked by the Rev. Liz Theoharis, left, and the Rev. Jesse Jackson, right, speaks during a Poor People’s Campaign demonstration in Washington, Monday, Aug. 2, 2021. RNS photo by Jack Jenkins

ool Center For Public Theology and Public Policy

o Mann

“Every movement toward a more perfect union in US history has needed organizations that built power for people & research centers that have helped shape a new narrative,” he wrote. “We will teach this history & engage divinity students, law students, & undergrads in moral fusion analysis, articulation, & activism in the tradition of Frederick Douglass & Sojourner Truth, Walter Rauschenbusch & Howard Thurman, Ida B. Wells, Dorothy Day, MLK & Ella Baker.”

Barber delivered the sermon at the inaugural prayer service for President Joe Biden in 2021.

He is also an activist who served as the former president of the NAACP. The pastor was arrested after protesting at the North Carolina Legislative Building in 2017 to call for a Medicaid expansion after staffers inside called the police to complain about the noise.

He previously taught at Union Theological Seminary and Duke University.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/rev-williambarber-ii-to-head-yale-divinity-school-center-forpublic-theology-and-public-policy/

Sen. Kamala Harris addresses a Poor People’s Campaign event in Washington, D.C., on June 17, 2019, as Rev. William Barber II listens in the background. RNS photo by Jack Jenkins

Nigerian Artists Carve Their Own Path in the NFT Space

By Ugonna-Ora Owoh

MOST PEOPLE BECAME AWARE of nonfungible tokens (NFTs) last year when Beeple’s Everydays: The First 5,000 Days sold for $69.3 million sale at Christie’s in New York. Though blockchain technology and web3 were becoming better known, for most, it was still unclear what impact NFTs would have on the global art scene. This was the case too in Nigeria where most people’s knowledge of NFTs had come from Prince Jacon Osinachi—regarded as the first artist who popularized crypto art or art on the blockchain in Nigeria.

In 2018, he joined Rare Art Lab, a platform that educated him on how to navigate art on the blockchain and with that he began to use Microsoft word as his medium. His story has gone on to inspire several Nigerian artists and he is the

first African to be featured at the Christie’s NFT auction. In March 2021, he sold art worth $75,000 in ten days followed by selling his piece, Becoming Sochukwuma for $80,000 on SuperRare. His success has built visibility for the Nigerian NFT scene.

The NFT scene in Nigeria is the largest in Africa’s art on the blockchain ecosystem due to the magnitude of its creator base. Though it is still in its infancy stages it has amassed a lot of success within a short span; with major players like Anthony Azekwoh and Prince Jacon Osinachi making huge sales of 5.5ETH or $25.4k and 22ETH or $83.2k respectively for their The Red Man and The Future is Female arts on SuperRare.

But the scene’s exceptional talent is what keeps it afloat, with several artists experimenting on

Photo: Art Tech District

Image: Freddi

different art disciplines and forms of arts including abstract figurations, sculpture, photography, and others.

Despite the space being in its early days with several challenges including a crypto ban and a small collector base, there are signs of promise.

Navigating the Nigerian NFT scene

“I’ve always wanted to be an artist but there wasn’t a way for me to make a living out of it considering how saturated the traditional art market is,” says Adewale Mayowa, a Nigerian artist. “So when I discovered NFT, it felt like the perfect place for me to begin my creative journey.”

Mayowa is one of the digital artists making waves in the NFT space in Nigeria. Prior to becoming a digital artist, Mayowa was in the medical field, but found it too demanding and was not sure how long it

would take him to get a good job position.

Learning about NFTs was much simpler for him with him only needing to read articles and watch YouTube tutorials to grasp the workings of the tech system.

“I wanted to escape from reality but at the same time create my own reality to express my creative urge [through surreal portraits]” Mayowa tells Quartz. But despite Mayowa’s success, being an NFT creator has not been an easy road.

“When I started NFT, it was hard for me because it felt like I wasn’t seen despite how unique my work is. What I didn’t realize is that it wouldn’t be an overnight success.”

But Mayowa’s story is very common in the Nigerian NFT scene. For new artists, navigating the blockchain space is very difficult, especially when trying to make sales—which plays heavily on the lack of a massive collector base in the country. NFT creators have to rely on international collectors to get their work sold and have to work hard to garner attention.

Nigeria’s cryptocurrency ban

The lack of a strong collector base in Nigeria is partly as a result on the Nigerian cryptocurrency ban, given that NFTs are mostly bought using cryptocurrencies.

On Feb. 5, 2021, the central bank of Nigeria (CBN) issued a press release restricting financial see page 106

Image: Adewale Mayowa

e Jacob

Nigerian Artists in NFT Space from page 105 sights and sounds, I’d always thought, ‘What if most of the tourist destinations we sought out as Nigerians were within our reach?’” says Olaosebikan. “During the lockdown, I started exploring the creation of experiential spaces, and when the world opened up, I immediately got to work. I wanted Disneyland, Universal Studios, and the Smithsonian all in one place. I am passionate about introducing technology to Nigerians in a fun, immersive, and interactive way.”

institutions around the country from transacting in cryptocurrencies. Though there might be a loophole to this through peer to peer (P2P) trades, it could explain the low NFT collector base in Nigeria. According to research by finder.com, only 13.7% of Nigerians own NFT assets.

Another artist, Freddie Jacob, likes the independence the NFT space affords her. She doesn’t want to pigeonhole herself and refers to herself as “an artist who happens to also sell NFTs” rather than an NFT artist. “I make art that is often inspired by stories I have experienced in society through an identity lens, culture, mental health, and portrayal of strong characters.”

She’s one of the women in the Nigerian NFT space who are trying to get more women into the space. Together with King Omobolarinwa, they both host the “Nigeria women in the NFT community” spaces on Twitter.

“Web 3 still has some reflections of the real world, there is still little diversity and inclusion,” she tells Quartz.

Jacob’s biggest challenge is the bear markets, “when the crypto market affects the buying and selling of NFTs” which often discourages artists like herself.

She also speaks of the issue of high minting fees which are difficult to pay especially given Nigeria’s current economic hardships.

Nigeria first digital exhibition and digital museum

The non-tangibility of NFTs, doesn’t reduce the possibility of exhibitions. This is thanks to the intersection of art and technology. In November 2021, one of Nigeria’s prominent NFT creators Anthony Azekwoh held his first ever digital exhibition, becoming. The show had more than a thousand viewers and garnered good sales.

The exhibition was organized by Art Tech District, a west African digital art museum. Founded by Mosope Olaosebikan in 2021, Art Tech District was his vision to provide a tourist experience while showing Nigeria’s past, present, and future stories through a technological lens.

“Traveling around the world and absorbing the

Though NFTs weren’t Olaosebikan’s plan, when they went viral, he got curious and realized how innovative it was. Now his mission is to show the enormous talent NFT creators in Nigeria and west

Photo: Izu Udokwu

Africa possess by bringing the world’s attention to them through exhibitions and shows.

NFT inclusivity in west Africa biggest art fair

Art X Lagos, west Africa’s biggest art fair is also revolutionizing the future of art on the blockchain. In November 2021, during the 6th international exhibition, the fair partnered with SuperRare to organize discussions around the blooming NFT space in Nigeria and Africa at large. The fair held events like NFT talks and also exhibition shows for digital artists within the continent and conducted sales.

Izu Udokwu is a storyteller, fashion designer, and artist who began his pivot to NFTs in February 2021. He had been heavily influenced by his friend Prince Osinachi’s art and he thought to try his luck in the space. He started making NFTs at the intersection of art and fashion.

His only difficulty with the space is trying to bring in more fashion designers who can tell fashion stories through art. “I was the first NFT fashion creator in Africa and probably still the only one in Nigeria,” says Udokwu. “I think trying to bring in more fashion designers in the space is really hard, a lot of designers are really terrified of the space because they are unaware of how to exist in the space and there is a need for the fashion NFT forum to really expand, to go beyond myself because you can’t exist alone.”

But he loves the space and the optimism from people who are keen to educate others about the space.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/nigerian-artistscarve-own-path-070500881.html

Source: https://qz.com/nigerian-artists-carvetheir-own-path-in-the-nft-space-1849886721

Image: Adewale Mayowa

Image: Freddie Jacob

Ker Ezhi, Ethiopian Leather Goods, Launches in the United States

By Ker Ezhi USA

THE TERM KER EZHI is a localized expression that encourages the values of commonality, prosperity, and peaceful coexistence. Ethiopia is home to the largest livestock population in Africa and is the birthplace of the second-largest community of African immigrants in the United States. Fekerte (Fifi) Abraham, CEO of Ker Ezhi USA, counts herself among the latter and has launched Ker Ezhi USA as a bridge between her passions and her heritage.

"Leather goods made from genuine Ethiopian highland sheep, goat, cow, and exotic options like crocodile and camel are preferred by many

countries globally for their quality and durability," says Abraham. "Supporting the artisans who handcraft these products and ensuring ethical and environmentally-friendly practices through the whole supply chain has been an important part of this journey."

Ker Ezhi taps into Indigenous and innovative trends, resulting in a beautiful line of luxury handbags, crossbody styles, business and travel gear, and accessories. Starting at $249, the quality is unmatched, and the brand is making soughtafter Ethiopian leather accessible to US-based consumers.

In addition to leather goods, Ker Ezhi USA will introduce Ethiopian gemstones and jewelry in the coming months. All products are manufactured and supplied by Ker Ezhi Ethiopia with the US collections personally curated by Ms. Abraham.

"As an experienced entrepreneur, I've had a long-held dream to work in fashion, specifically bags and accessories," adds Abraham. "I look forward to expanding access to and education around the exceptional products of my birthplace of Ethiopia within my beautiful chosen home of the United States."

Ker Ezhi USA is based in Virginia where Ms. Abraham has resided and raised her family for several decades. Products can be purchased online at www.kerezhius.com

The company welcomes inquiries from retailers, wholesalers, and buyers, which can be directed to info@kerezhius.com.

About Ker Ezhi USA:

Ker Ezhi is an ethical, luxury Ethiopian leather goods company, proud to now be available in the US market. Ker Ezhi offers luxury Ethiopian leather goods via their website www.kerezhius.com. Ethical practices, lifetime durability, and innovative designs are pillars of the brand's ethos.

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/ ker-ezhi-ethiopian-leather-goods-launches-in-theunited-states-301716539.html

Video: https://youtu.be/FS3frYP0Vl4

Image credit: www.kerezhius.com

New Initiative Promotes Diversity

Across Sectors in Italy From AP

THE FOUNDER of the Afro Fashion Association in Italy recently said she is launching awards recognizing the achievements of minorities in Italian society, to promote greater diversity and inclusion.

The first edition of the Black Carpet Awards will premier during Milan Fashion Week in February, sponsored by Instagram and Conde Nast.

Michelle Francine Ngonmo said she was inspired by a note she received from Virgil Abloh, the late fashion designer and founder of the Off-White label, recognizing her work promoting people of color in Italian fashion. It said simply: “I see you.”

“I know there are a lot of projects here in Italy that are doing real things, and not being seen,’’ Ngonmo told The Associated Press. “Why not celebrate them, all of them? When you celebrate someone, you empower them, you open minds and you talk about what diversity is.”

Ten awards will recognize leaders who promote inclusion, diversity and equity through culture, creativity, community, legacy and entrepreneurship. Five will be chosen by a jury, five will be popular people’s choice awards.

The first edition will focus on Italy, but Ngonmo said her goal is to make the awards global. The recipients will be

from under-represented communities — including people of color, people with disabilities and the LGBTQ community — who work in sectors such as fashion, design, art, food, music, technology, business, sport and cinema.

Ngonmo in 2015 founded the non-profit Afro Fashion Association in Italy to mentor people with multicultural backgrounds and work with companies to promote diversity and inclusion. She is also one of the co-founders of the We Are Made in Italy (WAMI) campaign launched on the heels of the Black Lives Matters movement with Italian-Haitian designer Stella Jean and Italy-based African-American designer Edward Buchanan.

WAMI has launched three groups of designers of color within Milan Fashion Week

since 2020 and has promoted a database of more than 3,000 people from multicultural backgrounds trained in fashion as a resource for companies wishing to become more diverse.

Ngonmo said she chose the name Black Carpet Awards not to focus on the Black community, but rather to emphasize the color black as “the sum of all colors.”

https://thegrio.com/2022/12/16/ new-initiative-promotes-diversityacross-sectors-in-italy Image credit: Tatiana Benedetti Fotografa, youtube.com

Michelle Francine Ngonmo

Afro Fashion Week Milan

2024 Paris Summer Olympics will Feature Breakdancing

By TheGrio Staff

THE 2024 PARIS SUMMER OLYMPICS will feature 39 sports and 329 events, including breakdancing, according to NBC News.

Buenos Aires, Argentina, hosted the Youth Olympic Games in 2018 where breaking made its Olympic debut. In 2020, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) recognized the athletic style of urban dance.

As theGrio previously reported, breakdancing is a street dance rooted in the Black community and hip-hop artists pioneered it in the ’70s and ’80s. Many of them were Black people and Latino people from the South Bronx.

Breakdancing will be featured at the 2024 Paris Games in an effort to attract younger viewers. Thomas Bach, president of the Olympics committee, has also highlighted certain other inclusive aspects of the 2024 Paris Games. “With this program, we are making the Olympic Games Paris 2024 fit for the post-corona world,” he said. “We are further reducing the cost and complexity of hosting the Games … we will see for the first time in Olympic history the participation of the exact same number of female athletes as male athletes.”

In breakdancing, competitors known as B-boys and B-girls will be judged on their technical skills, creativity and style, strength, speed, rhythm and

agility, the BBC reports.

“At the Paris 2024 Games, the breaking competition will comprise two events — one for men and one for women — where 16 B-Boys and 16 B-Girls will go face to face in spectacular solo battles,” according to the official website of the Paris 2024 Games.

“Athletes will use a combination of power moves — including windmills, the 6-step and freezes — as they adapt their moves and improvise to the beat of the DJ’s tracks in a bid to secure the judges’ votes and take home the first Olympic breaking title,” the program’s description continues.

Grace “Sunny” Choi, the current reigning USA B-Girl Champion, recently pointed out to Forbes one particular aspect that sets breakdancing apart. “Compared to other Olympic sports, one of the unique elements of breaking is that much of what you see is freestyled,” she said. “But breaking definitely requires more creativity and adaptability, adding an element of difficulty that a sport like gymnastics does not have.”

The two separate breakdance events are scheduled for Aug. 9 and 10, according to the official website.

https://thegrio.com/2023/01/19/2024-olympicswill-feature-breakdancing/ Image credit: Reddit, yesofcorsa.com

Theaster Gates and Prada Join Forces to Foster Designers of Color

By Maiysha Kai

THERE IS NO SHORTAGE of Black talent in all fields of design—but when it comes to a pipeline for that talent to be identified, fostered and succeed through their respective fields, the lack of access remains staggering. It’s a dichotomy acclaimed artist and academic Theaster Gates has long been on a mission to change by creating cultural spaces and incubators in his native Chicago. Now, with the help of Italian luxury label Prada, that mission progress with the launch of Now, he’s also one of 14 members of the inaugural class of the Dorchester Industries Experimental Design Lab.

According to the Chicago Sun-Times, The Design Lab is the result of a collaboration between Gates’ Rebuild Foundation and Prada Group, and “aims to uplift and invest in designers of colors in fashion, architecture and the industrial arts.” There are 14 members in its inaugural class, with disciplines ranging from fashion, accessory, graphic and product design to industrial, performing and culinary arts, to architecture and agriculture, and more.

Tthe Design Lab is just the latest iteration of Gates’ ongoing relationship with Prada; he cochairs Prada Group’s Diversity and Inclusion Advisory Council alongside Ava DuVernay. Seeking to make a deeper impact in diversifying the design world, he pitched Prada on making a more deliberate effort through the Design Lab.

“We spent a lot of time watching how many of the fashion houses in the design world and the museum institutions have been acknowledging and celebrating the contributions of Black artists and designers and people of color, but it felt like much of that has been marketing strategy,” Gates explained to the Sun-Times.

Named for the Chicago street where the Rebuild Foundation is located, the Design Lab will largely be based on the city’s South Side, with satellite events

and exhibitions in Los Angeles and New York. To identify the inaugural group of designers, candidates were nominated by luminaries across industries including DuVernay and late designer Virgil Abloh, who was also a Chicago native. The 14 designers selected will progress through the 18-month program in two groups, supported by over $250,000 provided by Prada.

As reported by the Sun-times, the inaugural class of Design Lab members includes: Kyle Abraham (New York), dance; Yemi Amu (New York), agriculture; Salome Asega New York), art, technology and design; Germane Barnes (Miami), architecture; Maya Bird-Murphy (Chicago), architecture; Brandon Breaux (Chicago), fine art and design; Damarr Brown (Chicago), culinary arts; Tolu Coker (London), fashion design; Summer Coleman (Chicago), graphic design; Kenturah Davis (Los Angeles), visual art; Mariam Issoufou Kamara (Niamey, Niger), architecture; Kendall Reynolds (Chicago), footwear; Catherine Sarr (Chicago), jewelry design and Norman Teague (Chicago), product design.

But the potential benefits of the Design Lab don’t stop with its first 14 designers; the mentorship and support they receive are intended to be paid forward.

“It’s really about innovation,” Sarr, founder of the fine jewelry brand Ch Vi

Almasika, told the Sun-Times. “It’s going to help me with my practice to think outside of my own industry … With Chicago, a city where you are constantly asked, ‘What are you doing for the city?’ I had never thought about social impact this way,” she added.

Fellow Design Lab member Teague echoes Sarr’s comments, telling the Sun-Times he sees the program as both an opportunity to collaborate and initiate “design coming closer to communities of color.”

“There’s just a huge impact of learning from one another that can happen,” he said.

https://thegrio.com/2022/04/07/ theaster-gates-and-prada-joinforces-to-foster-designers-ofcolor/

Image credit: Vittorio Zunino Celotto/Getty Images for Prada, pradagroup.com, Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times, Provided/Almasika

hef Damarr Brown, rtue Restaurant

Catherine Sarr

aster Gates

The Future of Global Music is African

By Martin Siele

averages 2.5 billion Afrobeats streams per month. I am more than convinced that African music will soon be the most popular in the world,” Charlotte Bwana, head of media and brand partnerships for streaming service Audiomack in Africa, tells Quartz.

AFRICAN MUSIC has always been great. But now more than ever, the world is taking notice, thus opening up more opportunities in the global entertainment market for Africa’s talents.

US summer hits by Afrobeats artists, global media houses signing up African artists at a record pace, Viral Tik Tok trends with African music. These are just a few of the visible ways that African music is going global.

The opportunities are plenty with the industry being touted as one that can boost economies, foster regional and global integration all while skyrocketing top artists to global stardom. Challenges however still remain in tapping into this enormous potential. Top among these include how to monetize fame especially for artists who ‘pop’ on Tik Tok, but not as much on streaming platforms and also professionalizing the industry so that artists can reap higher rewards from their fame.

If these challenges can be addressed, industry makers believe that not only will the future of African music be global, but the revenues earned from it will also reflect the popularity of African music globally.

Africa’s music boasts impressive figures

“On Audiomack we have handed out plaques to Burna Boy, Rema, Kizz Daniel, Wizkid, Bella Shmurda, Fireboy DML all for having 300 million streams and above on the platform. In August 2022 the most streamed artists on Audiomack included eight African artists out of the top ten. Audiomack

Streaming data confirms the rise in consumption of African music. Apple Music, for instance, reported a 500% overall streaming increase for African DJ mixes between August 2021 and August 2022. Nigeria, home of Afrobeats, posted the biggest bump with 3,000% year on year growth, with the streaming service also saying that Kenya, Uganda, and Ghana were among the biggest growth drivers.

When African countries made up 39 out of 80 new markets it expanded to in February 2021, Spotify cited its desire to accelerate the global discovery of new genres such as South Africa’s Amapiano, and to tap into the vibrant culture in these countries.

Warner, Universal Music Group, and Sony—the ‘big three’ labels which together control an estimated 69% share of the global music recording market— are tapping into the African music opportunity. Wizkid, Burna Boy, Davido, and Tiwa Savage all signed their major label deals within the past six years, and several others have signed more recently, such as Tanzanian sensation Diamond Platnumz and his Wasafi Records’ partnership with Warner announced in 2021, or the charttopping Wait for U star Tems who last year also inked a deal with Sony subsidiary RCA Records.

Major labels are also expanding their reach by

working more closely with labels in Africa, helping develop the next generation of stars. Warner’s 2019 agreement with Nigeria’s Mavin Records for example, is proving to be a fruitful partnership as since then, Mavin-affiliated artists including Ruger and Rema have broken into international markets with their hits.

Rema’s mega-hit Calm Down even got remixed by Selena Gomez in September. Peru star Fireboy DML and Sungba hitmaker Asake are both signed to Olamide’s independent label YBNL (Yahoo Boy No Laptop) Nation, which itself signed a joint venture deal with Empire Distribution—an American distributor and label—in February 2020. Peru was one of the biggest songs of 2022, and scored an endorsement from the Peruvian government in addition to an Ed Sheeran remix.

For artists and the African music industry in general, the possibilities seem endless and optimism is high. Everyday has felt like a day of new firsts, whether it’s Burna Boy and Wizkid breaking streaming records and winning awards, or Tems topping charts and collaborating with the biggest artists in the world, or Billboard introducing its first Afrobeats chart in the US in March.

What is fueling the growth of Africa’s music?

A mix of factors is driving this meteoric rise. Importantly, technology has made it easier for a global audience to discover artists from around the world. Streaming revenues have been growing at an average rate of 43.9% since 2014 and now

account for 65% of music industry revenues. Global streaming revenues in 2021 were up 24.3% from the previous year to hit $16.9 billion, while overall music industry revenues rose by around 20% to reach $25.9 billion.

The recent support of African artists by major record labels has also been a key factor. It signals optimism in the financial potential of Africa’s music. These labels today market, promote, and distribute African music in territories where a majority of music consumers previously haven’t interacted with Afrobeats, for example, resulting in African artists drawing in countless new fans everyday. The labels are also facilitating collaborations and partnerships between African artists and Western superstars and brands, continually exposing them to new audiences.

But while the rise is often attributed solely to the increasing international support, one underrated driver behind the growing international popularity of African music is the incredible intra-African support it receives. Music has managed what politics and governance so far hasn’t, by rendering colonial boundaries that define the continent useless.

Nigeria’s Afrobeats and Tanzania’s Bongo, for instance, are arguably the most popular genres in Kenya—East Africa’s largest economy—and often perform better in the country than music from Kenyan artists. According to YouTube data on which cities artists are getting the most plays from, for instance, Nairobi currently ranks as the top city in the world for Burna Boy and Fireboy DML, second for Tiwa Savage and Davido, and fourth for Wizkid. Nairobi has also long been the top city for Tanzania’s Diamond Platnumz, Zuchu, Ali Kiba, and Rayvanny among other Bongo music

see page 116

stars.

“The growing young African population have also become taste makers that cannot be ignored, we’ve got a generation of creators that have been empowered by the internet and streaming services, there’s no stopping them,” Audiomack’s Bwana says.

The African diaspora in Europe and the US among other countries has also been a major contributor to the increasing global popularity of African music. There are over 178,000 Nigerians living in the UK, for instance, and in areas such as Peckham, London where a large Nigerian community makes up ‘Little Lagos’, you will likely hear some Afrobeats while doing your shopping. This diaspora also shows up for Nigerian artists touring Europe and the US, and tag their friends and family along, helping expose their music to new audiences. Wizkid, for example, sold out the O2 arena in London in 2021 in twelve minutes.

African music has additionally been heavily bolstered by the growing popularity of dance videos and entertaining short-form videos on platforms such as Tik Tok. African music and culture has always been heavy on dance, and it’s therefore no surprise that creators across the world are opting for snippets of African hits to accompany their short videos. Videos using Mi Amor by Marioo (Tanzania) and Jovial (Kenya), for example, clocked over 7 billion views on Tik Tok, one of countless African songs that blew up on the platform.

“A lot of it is about access to the music…in the early days access to African music was limited to YouTube. But with streaming platforms such

as Spotify and Boomplay doing a lot more on the continent, music is being democratized even more,” creative economist Mutana Gakuru tells Quartz.

Are Africa’s musicians benefiting?

The state of global music monetization is especially important for African artists due to the, unfortunately, underdeveloped music remuneration and copyright protection systems in many African countries. Outside of performances, streaming represents the biggest revenue stream for many artists in Africa today.

Royalty collection organizations in the US and the UK pay billions out to artists every year, and have accurate data on radio plays and licenses required to use music in different formats and places, but similar organizations in African countries such as Kenya and Nigeria are yet to maximize their potential—with many facing challenges including gaps in the legal framework, the absence of adequate technology and data and mismanagement. Music sync and licensing deals, catalog buy-outs, and brand endorsements in Africa also aren’t yet as lucrative or common as in more developed markets. All this makes streaming earnings especially important for many artists in Africa compared to their global peers.

Therefore, raging music industry debates on the monetization of music used in Tik Tok videos, or artists’ share of YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music revenues, are discussions African artists and industry stakeholders should be at the center of. Tik Tok is the perfect example, as a showdown is brewing between labels and the Bytedanceowned platform over how it licenses music used on its platform. Tik Tok pays one-time buy-out fees to license music from labels for specified periods, as opposed to the revenueshare licensing

deals common with music streaming platforms.

Tik Tok argues that it isn’t a music streaming platform and, therefore, shouldn’t be treated as such. But calls are growing among label executives for a rethink of the approach to music monetization in the Tik Tok era, with suggestions put forward including paying royalties by the second, so artists can earn based on how long their music plays in Tik Tok videos. African music is incredibly popular on Tik Tok, and therefore such decisions will have a massive bearing on artists’ future earnings.

YouTube, probably the most popular music discovery platform for African fans, has been working to address discontent from artists and labels over its monetization set-up. But because most African talents get most of their YouTube views from within the continent, they are hit harder as advertising revenues per viewer or listener are much lower in Africa.

Spotify, which is now present in many African markets, has also faced long-running criticism across the globe. Pressure is also mounting on streaming services including YouTube, Apple Music, and Spotify to raise their prices, both in reaction to declining macroeconomic conditions and the push to pay artists more. While they have their flaws too, services including Mdundo, and Transsion-backed Boomplay have had a big impact in improving access to music streaming in Africa, by tailoring their products for African artists and audiences.

It is also crucial that African artists receive the necessary professional and legal support to

ensure they do not sign exploitative deals, as is common in the global music industry. Keen on international fame and success, African artists can easily fall victim to bad deals that could strip them of future earnings or even ownership of their music.

Music distribution firm

ONErpm’s Kenya country manager Bilha Ngaruiya says African stars today find themselves in a position where they can negotiate great deals. She also says that west African artists do much better in terms of having professional teams around them compared to artists from, say, east Africa—an understated factor in the rise of Afrobeats.

“With teams people strive to be as professional as possible…Most artists in Kenya don’t have teams. Ladipoe (Nigeria) has 15 people, including dedicated teams for different parts of the continent,” she says highlighting the importance of African artists being more intentional about promoting their music and brands professionally, instead of leaving the fate of their music in the hands of streaming algorithms.

The most important objective for sustainable and inclusive growth of the African music sector should be to strengthen the entertainment ecosystems in African countries so as to reduce reliance on international labels, consumers, and streaming platforms for revenue. The growing number of music industry professionals working to transform the field in Africa offers hope. African artists and fans should be the biggest winners from the global growth of African music.

“We’re going to change how the music business is done in Africa,” Ngaruiya says.

https://qz.com/the-future-of-global-music-isafrican-1849933474

Image credit: logodix.com, Capital XTRA, Live Online Radio, musicrow.com, Motoring Research, mobiFlip

The Final Afrochella Festival was an Ode to Ghana

By Chinekwu Osakwe

AFTER FIVE YEARS, AFROCHELLA has held its final performance. According to festival organizers, moving forward, Afrochella will be known as Afro Future Fest

In October, Goldenvoice, the company responsible for the famous Coachella music festival held every year in the California desert, sued Afrochella for copyright infringement. According to Rolling Stone, the lawsuit claims the similarity between the names of the festivals could cause confusion and imply “affiliation, connection, or association” with Coachella.

Though the company has not publicly responded to the lawsuit, a representative for the festival said the team is currently in the early stages of transition planning and rebranding.

This year’s festival theme was Afrofuturism, and much of the signage, including wording on the main stage which read “Afrochella is… Afro Future,” hinted at the change.

On the second day of the final iteration of Afrochella, Ghanaian culture seemed to be an intentional focal point as Ghanaian artists with storied careers took to the stage.

Mzbel, a Ghanaian “hiplife” artist whose career has spanned at least 20 years, performed a short set. She and her background dancers wore kente cloth outfits as she performed songs like 2007’s “16 Years.” Though her performance didn’t have the same pace as many of the more modern artists, the audience seemed to appreciate hearing recognizable throwback hits.

Another hiplife artist, TiC (formerly TicTac), performed songs such as “Fefe n’efe,” and “Kwani Kwani.” According to announcers at the festival, the rapper is the first Ghanaian artist to reach number one on the MTV Base music charts.

On the festival’s second day, the final two headliners were Nigerian artists Asake and Burna Boy. Loud and proud Ghanaian Shatta Wale, who

had the biggest performance of day one, was originally slated to be featured on Afrochella’s final day but swapped with Burna Boy after an unexpected delay.

For the final performance

of the night, Burna Boy entered the stage after a chorus of “Here comes the African giant” from the song “African Giant” off his 2019 album of the same name. He kicked off his performance with the song “Science,” accompanied by two stationary drummers at the top of the stage, before launching into a full set of his hit songs.

Though the activations at the festival didn’t change from one day to the next, it was clear festival organizers wanted to keep local culture on display. Centrally located in the open field space was a “Hausas of Ghana” activation.

A sign depicting the theme of the 2022 Afrochella Stadium in the greater Accra region of Ghana on (theGrio Photo/Chinekwu Osakwe)

Nigerian singer Burna Boy performing on the main stage at the 2022 Afrochella Festival at El Wak Stadium in the greater Accra region of Ghana on Dec. 29, 2022.

(theGrio Photo/ Chinekwu Osakwe)

Other West African nations, including Nigeria, are home to communities of Hausa people, but details about their contributions to Ghanaian culture were on full display, making the activation another popular photo destination for concertgoers.

Many, if not most, of the festival’s food vendors sold traditional Ghanaian food and drink. Accrabased Ewuraewoa Aso of Eno’s Kitchen handmade local drinks made of hibiscus and tiger nuts. She has been building her business from home for the last five years.

Aso said she applied to be a vendor at Afrochella to market her business and meet new people. “It’s been awesome — a lot of people from other countries like Nigeria, Germany, Cote d’Ivoire — they’re all here, and they love our drinks,” she added.

An activation featuring the Ghanaian Hausa ethnic group at the 2022 Afrochella Festival at El Wak Stadium in the greater Accra region of Ghana on Dec. 28, 2022. (theGrio Photo/Chinekwu Osakwe)

The owner of Eno’s Kitchen, Ewuraewoa Aso, selling locally made beverages at the 2022 Afrochella Festival at El Wak Stadium in the greater Accra region of Ghana on Dec. 28, 2022. (theGrio Photo/ Chinekwu Osakwe)

Maame Efua, a 31-year-old food vendor who has a Ghanaian food truck in Austria, traveled back to her home country just to participate in Afrochella as a vendor.

“Before I started being a vendor here, I just attended it once, and I just liked the vibe, the way that people mingle and vibe with everybody,” she explained, adding that she wanted to share her food with the type of crowd that comes to Afrochella.

Curious about Afrochella? Videos of performances from this year’s festival can be found on YouTube and VEVO, and a long-form documentary about the festival is also in the works, according to festival organizers.

https://thegrio.com/2023/01/10/the-finalafrochella-festival-was-an-ode-to-ghana/

a Festival at El Wak Dec. 28, 2022.

ONLY FIVE WOMEN have competed in Formula One. The last one to start in an F1 race was Lella Lombardi … in 1976.

A former delivery van driver for her family’s butcher shop in Italy, Lombardi won fans with her punishing speed and grit. When a journalist asked her how it felt to pilot such big cars, she replied, “I don’t have to carry it, I just have to drive it.”

F1 organizers seem to have realized that it’s time to have a woman (or two—gasp) back on the grid. This year they’re introducing the F1 Academy, a racing series and training program for women. “We will prove that female drivers have what it takes to compete at high levels,” says F1 Academy manager Bruno Michel, who’s also chief executive officer of F2 and F3, the series that feed drivers into F1.

Set to include 15 cars across 5 teams in a 21race season, the academy will receive $156,000 per car from F1, and drivers must contribute the same amount with their own money or through sponsorships. F1 says it will also feature an academy race at a Grand Prix in 2023.

The idea is that the F1 Academy will recruit talent from go-karting and junior racing series, give them loads of seat time and coaching in modified F4 cars, then graduate them directly to

F1 Want Wo Since 1976

By Hannah Elliott

F3, F2 and, in two or three years, F1. (F4 is an open-wheel racing category intended for junior drivers; the cars use four-cylinder engines with a power output capped at 160 brake horsepower.)

“F1 has faced reality regarding the lack of women in the sport,” says Vincenzo Landino, a motor sports reporter at FormulaMetric.com. “The fact that F1 responded by starting a pipeline shows it.”

This isn’t the first female-only racing series. When it premiered in 2018, the W Series (get it?) was criticized by prominent drivers including Pippa Mann and Sophia Flörsch for “segregating” women and preventing them from competing with the best drivers in the world. It also received no financial support from F1. Instead, W Series teams were backed by privately raised money from people such as Caitlyn Jenner, who founded Jenner Racing.

The F1 Academy has so far earned positive media coverage and is bolstered by vociferous pledges of support from F1 brass. “Formula One wants to ensure we are doing everything we can to create greater diversity and routes into this incredible

omen in the Cockpit for First Time

sport,” says Stefano Domenicali, president and CEO. “This is designed to provide another route for the drivers to succeed.”

F1 organizers haven’t specified when they’ll announce the 2023 race schedule and list of drivers. Likely candidates are young and hail mainly from Europe. There’s Dutch phenom Maya Weug, 18, who in 2021 became the first female member of the prestigious Ferrari Driver Academy, and Doriane Pin, 18, a French karting champion who won the Ferrari Challenge in 2022 and has recorded strong efforts in the FIA World Endurance Championship and European Le Mans Series. (Like male drivers, women rising through the ranks ride in such niche series to advance their skills and reputation.)

Jessica Hawkins, 27, is another contender. The British W Series podium finisher is perhaps most known as a stunt driver for the 2021 James Bond film No Time to Die. Abbi Pulling, 19, a Brit who last year became the first woman to drive an F1 car in Saudi Arabia, and Marta García López, 22, a Spanish karting ace and W Series veteran, would also be at home in F1 Academy development.

You might have noticed none of these drivers

is American. The sole US driver in the 2022 W Series, Chloe Chambers, would be a long shot for the F1 Academy. The dearth of American prospects reflects European countries’ efforts to foster competitive driving in young people more actively than the US, Landino says: “There has to be more investment into grassroots motor sport.”

F1 exploded in the US last year, with three races planned for 2023 and new episodes of the Netflix F1 documentary Drive to Survive on the way. Although the sport still falls far short of the ratings that the National Football Association gets, F1 races averaged about 1.5 million viewers per race in 2022, roughly the same as a regular-season National Basketball Association game.

The W Series has been struggling. Managers abruptly canceled races in September, citing financial problems. On Dec. 14 a spokesperson said CEO Catherine Bond Muir would not be available for comment until the spring of 2023. Insiders say the F1 Academy, by contrast, has the backing and goodwill required to thrive, so aspiring drivers may not have to turn to the family delivery van to get seat time.

“The important thing is, we know how well people like Bruno and Stefano run things, and we know that F2 and F3 work,” says David Tremayne, the prolific freelance motor sports journalist and former F1 correspondent for the Independent in London. “So this one will definitely work.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/ articles/2023-01-09/formula-1-hopes-to-addwomen-drivers-with-new-academy

Image credit: motorsportweek.com

Fast Food’s Biggest Innovators Right Now are Independent Black Vegan Chefs

By Kayla Stewart

A FEW YEARS after going vegan in 2011, professor Joslin Mar-Dai Pickens, EdD, was looking for ways to convince her daughter to try more plant-based eating. “She was a teenager and she wanted hamburgers and pizza,” Dr. Mar-Dai Pickens says. “Stuff that she would normally eat.”

So Mar-Dai Pickens, who lives in Shreveport, Louisiana, decided to re-create her daughter’s favorite family recipe—steak tips and mashed potatoes—using plant-based ingredients. Her daughter was hooked, and MarDai Pickens was inspired. What if she veganized other family recipes and regional dishes? She culled old cookbooks from her grandmother, and started testing vegan versions of local favorites like gumbo, wings, and hushpuppies. As she re-created these dishes in her kitchen, she began to convince her family of the endless possibilities in Black vegan food.

The family’s BBQ jackfruit brisket and vegan shrimp and grits became so popular that in 2019 they opened Vegans on the Run, the only Black- and family-owned vegan fast-casual restaurant in Shreveport, where more than half of the population

is Black. The restaurant serves plates like “catfish” made from banana blossom, and jackfruitseitan “chicken” wings glazed in a spicy lemon-butter-pepper sauce.

Mar-Dai Pickens joins a host of Black chefs and restaurateurs across the country that are taking Black cuisine and transforming it to be faster, more casual, and in many cases, more healthconscious. Some call it fast food and some call it fast-casual. But there’s a common thread: These restaurateurs are showcasing Black vegan food through cuisine that Black Americans are familiar with—encouraging more people to come into the fold.

Oakland’s Vegan Mob garners block-wrapping lines on a regular basis, and Slutty Vegan, which opened in 2018, now has locations in Georgia, Alabama, and New York, with more outposts on the way. Mushrooms form the bacon on Vegan-ish’s bacon cheeseburger in Philadelphia, and po’boys are filled with fried cauliflower at Vegan Vibrationz in Dallas. At Eduble Chefs in Miami, brussel sprouts, mushrooms, and Impossible meat pair with white rice and a coconut milk sauce. Vegans and non-vegans alike are eagerly showing up.

In the rush of openings and expansions, Black celebrities like John Salley, Lewis Hamilton, and Kevin Hart have entered the vegan fast-food space, launching fastfood restaurants that boast classic burgers (meatless, of course) and fries. In cities like Atlanta, Houston, and Los Angeles, crowds of diners line up for vegan burgers, shakes and take-out meals. Today, Black chefs and restaurateurs are at the forefront of casual vegan dining in America—creating an inventive plant-based approach to classic Black American dishes.

Vegan food has of course existed throughout Africa, Asia, and Latin America for centuries. Yet when it became popularized in the early 2010s in the United States, it was largely associated with whiteness. Vegan food was often served in expensive restaurants based in predominantly white communities, and accessing vegan cuisine that was also culturally relevant was a challenge for Black vegans. White restaurateurs took up the

most space in the industry, touting quinoa and veggie bowls, ignoring vegan dishes long enjoyed by communities of color. Now, Black chefs are shifting this narrative by offering less stuffy, oftentimes less expensive offerings.

In Dallas, Jovan Cole is serving vegan fast food like “shrimp” po’boys, cauliflower buffalo wings, and mac and cheese at Vegan Vibrationz, a popup food truck that operates on weekends at the Dallas Farmers Market. Thanks to the popularity of the pop-up, he’s preparing to open a permanent outpost at Legacy Food Hall in the nearby city of Plano, Texas. “As a vegan,

you couldn’t just go get you a fast burger or something quick like that,” says Cole. “That’s what led me on this vegan fastfood path.”

In Miami, Costa Rican native Christian Bernard draws from

his experience living in Costa Rica, New York, and Miami at his restaurant, Eduble Chefs. Bernard serves dishes like a beanheavy Still Smokin’ Chili Bowl and a vegan sausage fried rice, and he shares his beliefs about the environmental significance of vegan dining. “I try to drill down as much as possible to make this not just

see page 124

Vegans-on-the-run

Vegan Mob

Vegan Mob

Black Vegan Chefs from page 123

about the food, it's about the whole thing. It’s about the Earth,” he says.

In Oakland, there are consistently lines of customers wrapping around the block, eager to try the local favorites at Vegan Mob. Toriano Gordon, the vegan BBQ and soul food restaurant’s owner, believes that restaurants like his are a gateway to vegan cuisine for customers who want to enjoy a fast meal without taking on the health risks often associated with traditional fast food. There’s fried lumpia stuffed with Impossible meat, onions, and spices; a plant-based nacho cheesesteak; and candied yams brushed with a hint of cinnamon. Providing what he sees as an alternative to nonvegan fast-food options, Gordon says, “I like to say that we combat what McDonald’s has.”

Despite long-standing generalizations and racist myths about Black food being unhealthy, vegan restaurateurs know that much of Black food is rooted in fresh produce and farm-to-table cooking. Vegan cuisine for chefs like Lamarr Ingram, who runs Vegan-ish in Philadelphia, is an opportunity for Black vegan chefs to share vegan food through a Black American lens. Reflecting its name, Veganish isn’t entirely vegan, serving seafood alongside vegan mainstays like a plant-based cheesesteak, avocado toast, and breakfast sandwiches.

Ingram believes that his identity as a Philadelphia native and his familiarity with the challenges and needs there allow him to better connect with those in his community while speaking about veganism. “It’s a huge benefit when I’m trying to communicate why we’re doing what we do,” he says. “All the benefits that come with a plant-based diet, I’ve been able to experience them in a community I’m from, and where people are suffering from a lot of health issues caused by what we eat.”

Ingram points to the high number of chronic illnesses that disproportionately impact the Black community as his motivation to spread the goodness of veganism any way he can. Notably, vegan fast food can still be processed and isn’t always a healthier option to non-plant based foods. But overall, vegan diets are attributed to major health benefits, like a lower risk of heart disease and diabetes and a reduced chance of

Sluttly Vegan's menu item, Side Heaux Photograph By Mad

Pinky Cole (with microphone) at the grand opening of Slu Slutty Vegan

certain cancers. Many Black Americans— disproportionately impacted by climate change and health conditions associated with racism—see vegan eating as an opportunity to fight against these challenges. For many chefs, this new era of interest in plant-based cuisine feels like a timely opportunity to expand vegan fast-food concepts across the US, reaching new, curious consumers. Arguably the pioneer of fast-food vegan dining is Pinky Cole. She owns Slutty Vegan, which opened in Atlanta in 2018, and gained near instantaneous success thanks to its fast-food burger and fry offerings, seductive, playful menu names (Ménage à Trois, One Night Stand, and the Side Heaux, to name a few), and an unapologetically Black and carefree persona. Today, there are Slutty Vegan locations across the country. With more than half a million followers on Instagram, the Slutty Vegan dining experience is emblematic of modern restaurant success: fast, sexy, and Instagrammable. Pinky, who authored the recently released cookbook, Eat Plants, B*tch, is proud of the gradual change that occurred in the vegan community since opening her first location. “We can anchor a movement that can be impactful,” says Pinky. “That people will fall in love with.”

https://www.bonappetit. com/story/vegan-fast-foodmovement-black-chefs

elynne Boykin

tty Vegan Gwinnett. Courtesy Of

Vegan-ish menu item

Vegan Vibrationz dallas.eater.com

Eduble Chefs Artisan Ice

WINE. COCKTAILS. Luxury hotels. Fine dining. Elegance. International travel. There is that adage, “If you can dream it, you can do it.” But what if you can’t dream it because it’s not part of your reality? And then you go and do it anyway.

That, in essence, is the story of Zimbabweborn Durban-based Job Jovo, 41, named “Best Sommelier of Zimbabwe 2021” at a taste-off in Cape Town. Remarkable for a man who was almost 30 years old when he tried his first glass of wine. And didn’t like it one bit.

Jovo, who has a four-year economics degree and had anticipated a career in finance and banking, was waiting tables in South Africa’s acclaimed Swartland wine region when he had that (not so) early baptism-by-wine. Little did the largerthan-life people-person know he was destined to develop the kind of refined palate that would win him awards and earn him sommelier placements at top establishments.

Sincere, affable, down-to-earth, funny — with a delightful eye for life’s absurdities — and a great storyteller, he is not embarrassed to share that

Saluting the Vinous Odyssey of Zimbabwean

Wine Whiz Job

Jovo

By Wanda Hennig

back then, he added Schweppes lemonade to his wine. Made a spritzer. “Then it tasted amazing,” he laughs.

I spoke with Jovo for the first time by phone during COVID. He had recently moved to Durban to take up a management and head somm position at The Oyster Box, one of South Africa’s most celebrated luxury hotels. He and his wife, Nasstacia Gwatidzo Jovo, whom he met at college in Gweru, Zimbabwe’s third-largest town, were practicing being “part of the solution,” only venturing out for essentials. And prepping for his new gig by reading motivational books, taking turns cooking — “it’s a passion” — and opening “a good bottle of wine every couple of days.”

In the final week of 2022, I had the pleasure of speaking with him in person at 9th Avenue Waterside, Durban’s leading high-end destination eatery. He was not quite a month into his new gig: consulting head sommelier and general manager.

His story is an inspiring one. It shows what can happen when a person is open to opportunities, prepared to take calculated risks, reset goals and

Job Jovo

Job Jovo discusses wine while the 9th Avenue Waterside kitchen team prepares lunch

make adjustments in a life plan. He might choose to tell you his story over a cup of tea, ideally the acclaimed Zimbabwe brand, Tanganda. He was weaned on tea. True story. Preferred it to his mother’s milk as a toddler, according to his mom.

Fine tea. Fine wine. Job Jovo’s tipples of choice.

The Best Things in Life

Growing up in rural Zimbabwe, there were certain absolutes in the life of Jovo and his siblings. “We had to go to school, study hard and pass all the grades. We had to do basic sports. I played soccer. And we were expected to help in the fields in the rainy season, planting the maize meal, the pumpkins and other vegetables for our own consumption, so we’d never go hungry.” Lessons in self-sufficiency, he says.

His life was informed by his father’s vision and words. “My dad worked for a sugar plantation. With the little money he earned, he wanted the best education he could afford for his children. He would often tell us the finest things, the best things in life were living ‘in here.’ He would pick up a book, open it, point to the pages. He was teaching us that through education, you get skills, knowledge, empowerment.”

To this day, whenever he calls his dad, “he invariably asks me, ‘What are you studying?’” In Jovo’s chuckle, there is unreserved affection.

Jovo graduated from Zimbabwe’s Midlands State University. “We had a banker in our extended family. It was seen as a very fine thing to be. I imagined white-collar work in commerce would be a good career.”

But back in 2010, same as now, things were tough in his home country. The economy weak. Unemployment rife. “More and more, graduates were on the streets.

“So, like many others, I found my way to South Africa. I had a good friend in Riebeek-Kasteel who said I could stay with him to look for work.” Jovo knew he’d found his partner-for-life and didn’t want to lose her, so according to tradition, he paid lobolo or bride price, “which worked out to 11 cows, although most were paid for in money. We had our traditional wedding in 2011 and our white wedding in 2013, both in Zimbabwe.”

He and Nasstacia found themselves in a small

town surrounded by vineyards and little else about an hour’s drive from Cape Town. “It’s a funny set-up, Riebeek-Kasteel. Other than restaurants, and there are a lot of them, there is just one of everything. One hotel, one liquor store, one supermarket, which was then called The Friendly Supermarket. One doctor, one internet café.”

From this café, he applied for any economics or finance job he found listed in the classifieds of the main Cape Town newspaper. He never heard back. He also applied for teaching jobs, “because I knew I could teach commercial subjects.”

He adds, “I remember walking into schools in the Paarl area and other winelands towns. It was very frustrating. I kept thinking, so what was the use of going to school?”

Cult Wine Event

Meanwhile, his life began moving in a neveranticipated direction.

One Sunday his friend, a waiter at an upscale French-style bistro, suggested Jovo come help out. “I was surprised at how busy they were. People drove all the way from Cape Town for lunch. I bussed tables, helped as I could. At the end of the shift, the waiters gave me 10 percent of what they had received in tips. I was amazed at how much it was.”

He started helping out two or three times a week.

But not for long because he happened to wait on a man who turned out to be the owner of the nearby Royal Hotel, the oldest hotel in the Western Cape. “He invited me to come and work there. It was a lovely place. Fancy. I started there as a waiter.”

At the time plans were afoot in Riebeek-Kasteel for what would grow into something of a cult wine event. The first so-called Swartland Revolution wine festival was held in 2010. Plans were underway for the second when Jovo got to The Royal.

The participating winemakers, a legendary young bunch of disruptors and wine stars in the making (see this blog post for a backgrounder), met on the hotel’s stoep (veranda) to discuss and plan. Jovo would come to know them all almost as well as they knew each other. To know their wines. To appreciate, purchase and pour their wines.

see page 128

Back then, though, he just noted the passion, the humour, the energy—also their unrestrained support once they saw his unfolding interest in wine.

That year, 2011, “We thought 100 people would come to the Swartland Revolution weekend event. Instead, more like thousands turned up, some having traveled from across the world.”

For Jovo, “It was just insane. It seemed crazy. These winemakers. These farmers. All these people. Studying wine, coming to taste wine, to talk about wine, to buy wine.”

Fascinated by what he saw and encouraged by the winemakers who saw his interest, by his friend who knew Jovo was looking for a career, and by his boss at the Royal Hotel, “It hit home that there actually could be a career here.”

Red or White?

He had started purchasing a weekly bottle of Babylon’s Peak Chenin Blanc from the one liquor store and his Schweppes mixer from The Friendly. “That was the first wine I tried. And truthfully, nothing made sense,” he laughs his quiet chortle. “When I tasted it, it tasted sour. But then mixed with the Schweppes lemonade, it tasted amazing.”

He tells the story of what could be called his first somm experience in the restaurant at the Royal Hotel. “Every day I was serving food and wine. There was a popular dish I loved to recommend, Chicken Valentino. Chicken breast stuffed with peppers, thyme, bacon, delicate flavors, cooked sous vide, finished on the griller so it’s crispy. Served with a mash and other nice things. Then the guests would ask me, what do you think I should drink with this?

“I had no idea. Look, I’m from Zimbabwe where we drink beer and maybe some gin, which we mix wrong with Coca-Cola,” he laughs.

Downstairs, though, there was the wine cellar. “So I got into the habit of memorizing from the labels — what the winemaker said — the profile of one white wine and one red wine. By default, the white was the Babylon’s Peak I was already buying for myself. For the red, I memorized the Riebeek Cellars Kasteelberg pinotage.” This being

a South African grape.

“So I would ask if they would rather have a white or a red and if someone wanted a white, I would talk about the chenin. If they wanted red, I would talk about the pinotage.” His accent, at a stretch, sounds kind of French, which likely helped. And this wine strategy worked.

Seeing life had taken this vinous turn, in 2013 he finally took the leap. Signed up to do classes with the Cape Wine Academy in Stellenbosch. Every Friday, initially for three months, he borrowed his

Job Jovo and Chef Theo Chiloane discuss a dessert wine pairing for this guava sorbet and corn ice-cream sandwic treat

Job Jovo discusses a Chardonnay pairing for Chef Chiloane’s langoustine starter at Durban’s 9th Av Waterside

friend’s car, paid him a fee, and drove to classes in what is arguably, given its history, the country’s most famous wine-producing region with, he points out, eight distinct wine-producing areas, each giving rise to wines with distinctive styles.

“And this course was amazing. All these senior winemakers, in person, teaching us how to taste wine professionally. How to analyse the wine. What to look for. How to taste it. The subtle differences. It was so thorough.” As his palate developed and he learned what to recognize and appreciate — and wine started making more sense — his spritzer days were over.

Highest Standards of Sommeliering

When I spoke to Jovo that first time, during his Oyster Box days, he had recently returned from Austria, where he had done his exams over ten days with the Court of Master Sommeliers, the international institute recognized for teaching the highest standards of sommeliering. This a natural progression after doing courses offered by the Cape Wine Academy and subsequently WSET, the Wine and Spirit Education Trust, governed by the London-based International Wines Education Centre.

In 2015, he became a member of the South African Sommelier Association, which involved more learning and training. Also in 2015, he left the Royal Hotel to join the luxury five-star Grande Roche Hotel in the wine-growing area of Paarl, encouraged by his then-boss, who recognised Jovo had outgrown opportunities at that establishment and invited by a woman he’d waited on, and impressed, who turned out to be the GM.

“When I got there, it was like a candy store. The wine cellar, the collection was amazing. Some of the oldest wines I had ever tasted.” A special memory — he can name all the wines that have given him goosebumps — was when a guest ordered the two bottles of 1998 Romanée-Saint Vivant Premier Cru the Grande Roche had in stock. “He asked if I had tried it. I said no and he poured me a glass to taste. It was my first time experiencing an old red Burgundy. It was magical.”

You’ve Got the Job!

Jovo’s move to the Oyster Box was from Cape Town’s prestigious waterfront Victoria & Alfred Hotel, where he had his most memorable job interview to date. “The GM and I spoke about wine, got to understand each other at a personal level. Then he excused himself, left the room and returned with four poured glasses of wine. I thought, hey, this man wants me to do a blind tasting.”

Sure enough. There were two whites and two reds. Jovo did the whole tasting ritual. First wine a viognier. Second, a sauvignon blanc, “not very green, I thought coastal.” Third, a pinot noir. Fourth, “I couldn’t taste any flavor. There was something wrong with the wine. I realized it was oxidised.” The GM was testing him. Wanted to see if he would try to give a varietal or if he was familiar with faulty wine. Just like that, “he said, you’ve got the job!”

There, he ran the restaurant, organized the hotel's daily operations and introduced a monthly gin “high tea” where people could pick their botanicals and choose to build their drink from 20 to 30 gins. “What I like about being a sommelier is it is a lot more than selling wine, discovering varietals, talking about flavor and being able to pour every cocktail. It incorporates the business and the management side and daily operations.” And you need to be a culinary pro as you’re working with leading chefs doing tastings, pairings and giving suggestions.

In his industry relationships are key, Jovo (follow him on Facebook) stresses. Relationships with customers, with winemakers, the people you’re working with, often training and mentoring. Working in the wine industry, he says, is more than a career. It’s a way of life. You must be passionate about the world of wine and you need to make a personal commitment to learn something new every day.

Fortunate, it would seem, his banking dreams bit the dust.

Follow the ZimmSomms on Instagram and BLACC, The Black Cellar Club.

https://www.cuisinenoirmag.com/zimbabweanwine-whiz-job-jovo/

Image credit: Wanda Hennig

MAJ. GEN. LORNA MAHLOCK , a senior officer in the United States Armed Forces, recently wrote her name in the history books after she became the Marine Corps’ first Black female two-star general. According to Military.com, Mahlock’s feat adds up to other historic milestones that women and minorities in the military have achieved this year

Mahlock, who was born in Jamaica, was nominated by President Joe Biden at the beginning of the month. The Senate subsequently gave the green light for her promotion on December 15. Mahlock is currently the deputy director of cybersecurity for combat support at the National Security Agency.

“Congrats to Brig. Gen. Lorna Mahlock, confirmed Thursday [December 15] to major general,” the NSA’s director of cybersecurity, Rob Joyce, tweeted in response to her promotion. “She is an awesome leader, great partner, and the deputy director of cybersecurity for combat support here at NSA. Blazing a trail as the first Black woman two star marine!

Mahlock’s history-making feat adds up to other significant milestones she has reached. In 2018, her promotion to the rank of a one-star brigadier

Jamaican-born Woman Makes History as Marine Corps’ First Black Female Two-star General

By BOTWC Staff

general made her the Marine Corps’ first Black woman to attain that position. She was also the first woman to be appointed as the Marine Corps’ chief information officer.

Mahlock was 17 when she immigrated to the United States from her native Jamaica, a biography from her alma mater, Marquette University, states. She enlisted in the Marine Corps three months after her arrival.

Over the course of her career, Mahlock has served as an air command and control officer and has also taken up the role of the director of the Marine Corps Instructional Management School. She also has several master’s degrees.

The Marine Corps is one of the smallest branches of the military, the Marine Corps Times reported. The number of women serving on that force is said to be the lowest at 9%. But that notwithstanding, the Marine Corps has implemented significant changes for women. Prior to 2016, women were not allowed to serve in combat.

“I’ve seen that barrier lifted in my career,” Mahlock told her alma mater last year. “We’ve got women flying strike aircraft,

Gene

Nigeria and

Ghana Can Rest Now as UNESCO Declares Senegal Origin of Jollof Rice

By Rachael Omidiji

IN A LONG-STANDING DEBATE between West African nations Ghana, Nigeria, and Senegal, UNESCO has officially recognised Senegal as the origin of Jollof rice, also known as Ceebu jën in Senegal. The dish, which is foremost in West African cuisine, is made of rice and fish, spiced with vegetables and tomatoes.

The Conversation Africa’s research shows that the origins of Jollof rice can be traced to the entrenchment of colonial rule in West Africa between 1860 and 1940. French colonizers replaced food crops with broken rice imported from Indochina during this period. Meanwhile, broken rice became more priced for the Senegalese than a whole rice grain, which birth the dish called Ceebu jën.

Ceebu jën has become a source of pride and cultural identity for the Senegalese and has been recognised as an intangible heritage of humanity by UNESCO. This certification is expected to

positively impact the economy, particularly tourism, agriculture, fishing, and catering.

In addition, Jollof rice is also closely linked to a particular way of life, and the consumption of the dish is connected to ceremonial events. The women of Saint Louis, a port city in Northern Senegal, are known for their remarkable know-how in this area and have been credited with adding elegance and spices to the dish.

The Senegalese version of Jollof rice, Ceebu jën, is now officially recognised by UNESCO as an intangible heritage of humanity, putting an end to the ongoing debate over its origins and solidifying Senegal’s claim as the true home of Jollof rice.

https://tribuneonlineng.com/nigeria-and-ghana-canrest-now-as-unesco-declares-senegal-origin-of-jollofrice/

Image credit: royacshop.com

women in the infantry and artillery and tanks. … Regardless of where you’re from or your color, gender or ethnicity, we’re just trying to figure out how to build the best fighting force.”

Mahlock’s promotion also comes after Lieutenant General Michael E. Langley became the first Black four-star general in the Marine Corps’ 246year history, Face2Face Africa reported in July.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/jamaican-born-woman-makes-historyas-marine-corps-first-black-female-two-star-general/ar-AA15wpJF

Image credit: foundationforwomenwarriors.org, lakerlutznews.com

ral Michael E. Langley

Who was Yasuke and What Does He Mean to Blerds and Black History?

By ShaCamree Gowdy

Yasuke's disputed ascent to the rank of samurai was a notable outlier because, in addition to not being a member of the class by birth, he was also an outsider because of his skin color.

ALTHOUGH ACTUAL ARCHIVAL information about Yasuke is sparse, various versions of narratives about his existence have seen daylight in recent years. As the Smithsonian noted, his persona is featured in “Nioh,” a 2017 video game. Three years later, the children’s book, “Yasuke: The Legend of the African Samurai,” by Jamal Turner was published. In 2021, Netflix released a six-part action anime series, “Yasuke,” from Black animation director LeSean Thomas and featuring actor Lakeith Stanfield voicing the titular character.

The tale of Yasuke, which dates to the 16th century, is an old one: An African man — the first that Japan ever saw — becomes the first nonJapanese to hold the rank of samurai. However, his name is likely not found in the history textbooks used in most schools.

Despite accomplishing something so extraordinary — and, to put it simply, unheard of — Yasuke’s story has yet to be widely known, at least in the eyes of a George Hilton, co-founder of Blerdcon, the popular Black nerd convention — the biggest multi-fandom event of its kind — that focuses on nerd culture, diversity, inclusion, gaming, anime, cosplay, sci-fi, music and comics. To him, it’s no secret that we are unearthing, sharing and celebrating our history in real time because it has not yet been entirely told.

“We as a nerd community, and we as a Black community in general, share a lot of resonance with the Yasuke story and with the Yasuke individual,” Hilton, who co-founded Blerdcon in

2016 with Hassan Parrish, told theGrio. “We have, often as people, not been told and have not been recognized for things, accomplishments, places we’ve pioneered, achievements we’ve achieved and flags that we’ve marked throughout not just American history, but world history.”

Samurai, or “one who serves,” were in and of themselves a social class. Their duties often included policing, managing the rice tax, bodyguarding, doing administrative work if they were affluent or working for wealthy people and fighting when necessary.

Even though having the title had advantages, whether social or financial, not all samurai were created equally. Yasuke’s disputed ascent to the rank of samurai was a notable outlier because, in addition to not being a member of the class by birth, he was also an outsider on the grounds of skin color and nation.

In 2019 — the year before he died from colon cancer — “Black Panther” star Chadwick Boseman

Yasuke was the first Africa in Japan. (Illustration: Anthony

reportedly signed a deal to bring Yasuke to liveaction life on the big screen.

While more and more Black nerds are becoming familiar with Yasuke’s story, you will still see few of them dressing up as him, according to Hilton, because samurai cosplay, with all its layers and intricate features, is difficult to pull off.

“I think that Yasuke’s real story has yet to be told and I’m hoping that it gets picked up and you’ll start to see more portrayals of him because he was such a remarkable figure,” Hilton said. “When we do, I think it’s going to be nothing less than fantastic because so much of where he was and what he did had a costuming aspect to it.”

https://thegrio.com/2023/02/02/ who-was-yasuke-what-does-hemean-to-blerds-black-history/

This 1605 drawing of a Black sumo wrestler may depict Yasuke. Illustration by Meilan Solly / Photos via Wikimedia Commons under public domain

an and first non-Japanese man to hold the title of samurai y Azekwoh via Creative Commons)

Celebrations

African Diaspora Independence Days

J

R CAMEROON - J . 1, 1960

R HAITI - J . 1, 1804

D R SUDAN - J . 1, 1956

F

G GRENADA - F 07, 1974

R T GAMBIA - F . 18, 1965

SAINT LUCIA - F 22, 1979

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC - F . 27, 1844

A R EGYPT - F . 28, 1922

WESTERN SAHARA - F . 28, 1976

M

K MOROCCO - M 2, 1956

R GHANA - M 6, 1957

S MAURITIUS - M 12, 1968

R TUNISIA - M 20, 1956

R NAMIBIA - M 21, 1990

A

R SENEGAL - A 4, 1960

S N Z MOROCCO

(M ) - A 7, 1956

R ZIMBABWE - A 18, 1980

MOROCCO (S S Z , M ) - A 27, 1958

R SIERRA LEONE - A . 27, 1961

R TOGO - A 27, 1960

M

P ' D R ETHIOPIA -

M 5, 1941

R CUBA - M 20 ,1902

S ERITREA - M 24, 1993

C - R GUYANA - M 26, 1966

R SOUTH AFRICA - M 31, 1910

J

NIGERIA (B C N ) - J 1, 1961

A A ' R V

(J ) - J 19, 1865

R MOZAMBIQUE - J 25. 1975

D R MADAGASCAR -

J 26, 1960

R DJIBOUTI - J 27, 1977

R SEYCHELLES - J 29, 1976

D R CONGO

(KINSHASA) - J 30, 1960

MOROCCO (I ) - J 30, 1969

R BURUNDI - J 1, 1962

R RWANDA - J 1, 1962

D R SOMALIA - J 1, 1960

D P R

ALGERIA - J 3, 1962

R CAPE VERDE - J 5, 1975

F I R COMOROS - J 6, 1975

R MALAWI - J 6, 1964

C THE BAHAMAS - J 10, 1973

D R SÃO TOMÉ AND PRINCIPE - J 12, 1975

R LI BERIA - J 26, 1847

A

R BENIN - A . 1, 1960

R NIGER - A . 3, 1960

P D R BURKINA

FASO - A . 5, 1960

G JAMAICA - A 06, 1962

R CÔTE D'IVOIRE (I C ) -

A . 7, 1960

R CHAD - A . 11, 1960

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC - A . 13, 1960

R CONGO (BRAZZAVILLE) -

A . 15, 1960

R GABON - A . 16, 1960

R TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO - A

31, 1962

S

K SWAZILAND - S . 6, 1968

F S C ST. KITTS

AND NEVIS - S 19 1983

G BELIZE - S 21, 1981

R MALI - S . 22, 1960

R GUINEA-BISSAU - S . 24, 1973

R BOTSWANA - S . 30, 1966

CAMEROON (B C S ) -

O . 1, 1961

F R NIGERIA - O . 1, 1960

R GUINEA - O . 2, 1958

K LESOTHO - O . 4, 1966

R UGANDA - O . 9, 1962

R EQUATORIAL GUINEA - O . 12, 1968

R ZAMBIA - O . 24, 1964

G ST. VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES - O 27, 1979

MOROCCO (I Z , T ) -

O . 29, 1956

N

G ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA -

01 N 01, 1981

C DOMINICA - N 03, 1978

P ' R ANGOLA - N . 11, 1975

R SURINAME - N 25, 1975

I R MAURITANIA - N . 28, 1960

BARBADOS - N 30, 1966

U R TANZANIA - D . 9, 1961

R KENYA - D . 12, 1963

LIBYA (S P ' L A

J ) - D . 24, 1951

www.thoughtco.com/chronological-list-of-africanindependence-4070467

www.caribbeanelections.com/education/ independence/default.asp

Image credit: istockphoto.com

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ADIS23

8th Annual African Diaspora Investment Symposium

Theme “Future Ready Africa”

March 22 – 24, 2023

Computer History Museum

Mountain View, CA USA

Informa on/Registra on Here

Host: African Diaspora Network

Afro Na on Portugal 2023

June 28-30, 2023

Por mao, the Algarve, Portugal

Informa on/Tickets Here

Roadmap To Billions|NYC 2023

Brooklyn Navy Yard

Brooklyn, NY USA

May 18 – 20, 2023

Panels, Pitch Conpe on, Networking

Informa on and Tickets Here

BlerDCon - Fae'd to Black

Hya Regency Crystal City

Arlington, VA USA

July 7 – 9, 2023

Highlightsand celebrate Blerd culture, explore a marketplace of ideas and sharing culture

h ps://blerdcon.com/