DAWN

DAW

Business

"Black People are Going to Eat Dinner at the Movies"

Ebay Launches “Hub” for Black-owned Fashion, Beauty Brands

3BlackDot, One of the Few Black-Owned Media Companies

4 Things Good Leaders Do When Facing Obstacles

Steve Jobs Had a Brilliant 3-Step Method for Solving Difficult Problems.

The Secret to Building a Successful and Las ng Business

4 Ques ons Venture Capital Investors Will Ask in Your Pitch (and How to Answer Them)

Want to Reach the Best Decision? Stop and Ask Yourself These Ques ons First

How This First-Gen Somali American Turned His Knack for Languages Into a Go-To Enterprise Service

1 Ques on Every Boss Should Ask Themself

Nonkululeko Nyembezi is the First Black Woman Named as Chairman to Africa’s Biggest Lender

Why Duolingo is Making Zulu Free to Vodacom’s 45 Million Subscribers

Safaricom Ethiopia Launches Mobile Telecom Network, Services

Brands are Already Making Millions in the Metaverse. Here's What Business Owners Need To Know.

4 Odd Brain Hacks That Will Supercharge Your Crea vity

YouTube and Instagram Join TikTok with New Social Commerce Tools

Africa’s Payments Startups are about to Face Compe on from a Brazilian Unicorn Development

How AfCFTA Can Boost Africa’s Cultural Economy

LinkedIn Rolls Out New Tools to Give Creators

More Ways to Share Visual Content

How This Chinese Immigrant Removed the Pain-and Expense--of Ge ng a Green Card

Building a City of the Future

Can the World Really Run on 100% Renewable Energy?

Google Picks South Africa for its First Cloud Region in Africa

Africa’s First Hydrogen Power Plant to Produce Electricity by 2024

Bill Gates says Rich Countries are Tackling Hunger in Africa all Wrong

Reimagining How and Where Fresh Food is (Can Be) Grown.

Pandemic-Health

Moderna Gives WHO’s mRNA Hub Some Help, Pfizer Snubs Request Governance

Ethiopia Accepts African Union Invita on to Peace Talks

Uganda Pays First War Repara ons Payment to DR Congo

Another Caribbean Country Considers Removing Queen Elizabeth as Head of State

Biden Announces US-Africa Summit for MidDecember

Black Harvard Grad Kwasi Kwarteng Appointed Britain's First Black Finance Manager

Zimbabwean University Unveils its CBDC Design

Senegal’s Macky Sall Delivered a List of Striking African Demands at This Year’s UNGA

United Na ons says 50 Million People Worldwide Stuck in ‘Modern Slavery’

Amanda Gorman UN Poem: ‘An Ode We Owe’ Investment

African Stock Exchange/Bourse

Africa Defies Global Trend With Funding for Startups Surging

Dr. Iman Abuzeid is Now One of a Few Black Women Founders to Lead a Billion-Dollar Company A er Incredible Health's $80M Series

African Web 3 Super App Jambo Raises $7.5M in Seed Round

Climate Bill Could Create 1,000 New Companies

Electric Ba eries are Fueling the Shi from

Petrol-Powered Bikes in Kenya

ROAM Launches

Electric MassTransit Bus in Africa

4 Vital Ques ons

Business

Must Answer

10 Ques ons Your Pitch Deck Needs

Answer

These Four Countries are Leading Africa’s Startup Scene

South Africa’s Talk360 Raises $4M to Build Single Payment Pla orm for Africa Technology/Science

Microso is Leading Big Tech’s Push to Relocate African Developers to North America

The LimitlessMetaverse: Not Just a Moment, but a Movement

Ready to Engage With Customers in the Metaverse? Here’s What You Need to Know

Boos ng your Business Using Visuals That Resonate with your Audience

MIT Scien sts Have Developed a new Kind of Camera —from a Crab

YouTube in Challenge to TikTok to Give Shorts Creators 45% of Ad Sales

USTDA Commits to Internet Access Project in the DRC

Small Nuclear Reactors Finally Get the Nod from Regulators

Lifestyle/Culture

Thousands Gather to Fete South Africa’s new Zulu King

Contents from page 3

116 A Comba ve African

Postmortem of Queen Elizabeth

II’s Legacy is Inevitable

118 African Cuisine Made Mainstream: Roberta Brown Cooper’s Sumptuous Culinary Journey Across Regions

120 Pritzker Prize Winning Architect Francis Kéré on What the West S ll gets Wrong About Africa

122 For First Time ever, a Black Woman has won the Pres gious Nasher Prize for Sculpture

125 Jonathan Majors’ Kang the Conqueror to carry MCU Mul verse Saga on his Shoulders, Studio Chief Says

127 Ne lix Africa Bosses Talk Originals, Co-Produc on Strategy and Expansion Plans: ‘We Can Only Go Forward and Spend More’ (VARIETY EXCLUSIVE)

129 Zambian Wins 2022 BBC Komla Dumor Award

130 Iyanu: Child of Wonder Will Bring Nigerian Culture to the Forefront

132 EmefaCole AppointedInaugural Curator of Jewelry, Diaspora, at V&A

133 Soul Cap, a Swimming Cap Designed for Black Hair, Approved a er Ban from the Olympics

History

134 Bicycle Nomad and Others

Recreate 1,900-Mile Ride of Buffalo Soldier Bicycle Corps

Agriculture - Business - Commentary - DevelopmentEducation - Governance - History - Investment Lifestyle/Culture - Technology/Science

About the Africa Business Association

TheAfricaBusinessAssociationisan 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 entrepreneursinAfrica.

work to help you have access to news and events as starting points for constructive conversations and callstoaction.Weseektocutthrough the froth of the political spin cycle to underlyingtruthsandvalues.Wewant to be so focused on progress that togetherwecanprovideacredibleand 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

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

Sheila Siwela, Ambassador

Kone L. Tanou, Ambassador

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

Ricky Katsuya

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"BlackPeopleareGoingtoEatDinner attheMovies"-HowMagicJohnson's MarketAwarenessPropelledhisStarbucks andeaterBusinesses

By Virgil Villanueva

MAGICJOHNSONDIDN'Tbecomeasuccessful business magnate simply by capitalizing on his stature as a basketball icon and the fortune that came along with it. Instead, Johnson, whose estimated net worth runs up to $600 million, workedhiswayupthebusinessladderbyapplying what he observed in the inner-city neighborhoods where he grew up in.

Kool-Aid

A good chunk of Johnson's business portfolio is a chain of first-rate movie theaters in urban communities—Magic'smarketofchoice.Johnson had already learned that one of the first things an aspiring businessman should do is to know his customer. Magic, who grew up in the inner-cities of Michigan, knew his market like the back of his hands. Instead of serving the usual food items in the concession stands, Magic added Kool-Aid. It was a little tweak that caused their revenues to soar.

"See, you've got to understand black people. I know my customer base, because I'm it. I told Loews, blackpeoplearegoingtoeatdinnerat the movies -- those hot dogs are our dinner. Same with the drinks. Our soda sales were just O.K. I said black people love flavored drinks, because we were raised on Kool-Aid. So we put in punch andstrawberrysodaandorange,andthenumbers wentthroughtheroof,"Johnsonsaid,pertheNew YorkTimes.

Apartfromtheflavoreddrinks,Johnson'stheater concessionsalsohaveotherneighborhoodstaples like Buffalo wings, pizza, and popcorn shrimp.

Perhaps Johnson's most lucrative business partnership is with Starbucks. When he sealed a dealwithStarbuckschiefexecutiveofficerHoward Schultz in 1998, Magic claimed that he knew he had become a "serious businessman."

Like the chain theaters, Johnson took the Starbucks brand to underserved urban communities. He removed scones from the Starbucks menu and replaced them with food items that are familiar to the urban customer.

"Peoplesaidthere'sno wayLatinosandAfricanAmericans will pay $3 for a cup of coffee. Yes, we will pay $3, but we don't eat scones. I had to takesconesoutofmyStarbucksandputinpound cake, Sock It to Me cake and sweet potato pie — things that resonate with the urban consumer. You have to know your customer and you have to speak to that customer every day," Johnson said, per Knowledge at Wharton.

It was a minor tweak but generated millions for Starbucks. It also proved Johnson's hypothesis thattheAfrican-AmericanandLatinocommunities' spending power is quite robust. Not only did Johnson provide these communities access to filmsandcoffee,buthealsoraisedtheemployment rate.

In thesameway, Magicmade teammates better during his playing days; he made the lives of people in theinner-cities waybetter,too.

https://www.basketballnetwork.net/latest-news/blackpeople-are-going-to-eat-dinner-at-the-movies-howmagic-johnsons-market-awareness-propelled-hisstarbucks-and-theater-businesses

Ebay Launches “Hub” for Black-owned Fashion, Beauty

By Ezreen Benissan

EBAY UK IS LAUNCHING a new hub on its website called Black in Bloom to connect consumerstoBlack-owned SMEs.

Fashion, beauty and other consumer goods such as household products will be sold on the hub by graduates of the Black Girl Fest X Ebay Sellers academy. Brands include Odyssey Box, a plant-based curly and Afro hair online store and subscription box; and Garm Manager, a vintage and modern pre-loved clothing firm.

One in five Gen Z consumers want to purchase from a business that supports people from underrepresented groups, an Ebay report found. “Weareseeingfromabuyerpoint-of-view,theyare coming to the platform wanting to shop with their values front and centre,” says Chris Gale, head

of social impact at Ebay. He adds that there is a clear need to make it easier for socially conscious buyers toshop from Black-owned businesses.

The launch follows a series of collaborations betweenEbayandBlackGirlFest(BGF),afestival and platform designed for Black women, girls and non-binary people. In April, the companies launched an academy to nurture entrepreneurs withone-to-onetrainingfor12to14weeks,aswell as mentoring to help upskill their e-commerce. Once graduated, brands can then sell via the Black in Bloom hub. “Once they’ve got those skills the hub is really a way for us, Ebay, to drive traffic towards those businesses,” saysGale.

Ebay hopes to empower close to 200 Black women-led e-commerce businesses this year via the programme. “Lots of businesses start

Black Girl Fest launched in2017 by Nicole Crentsil (right) with the aim of supporting Black womenentrepreneurs. Photo: Karl Lake Photography

Beauty Brands

programmes and then they die after a year,” says Gale. “The hub is partly a commitment from Ebay tosaythatthisisanareawewanttofocusonover multipleyears.”

The pandemic forced a lot of SMEs to lean into e-commerce, says BGF’s founder Nicole Crentsil. “Individuals were seeing platforms and marketplaces like Ebay as the place to go. So, it was really understanding how we can support founders in an environment like Covid-19… Ebay was at a point where they were trying to create economic opportunities for founders and I kind of steeredEbaytowardsthebarriersthataffectBlack women founders specifically.”

Thereportfoundthatone in 10Ebayconsumers say they don’t buy from Black-owned businesses because they don’t know where to find them. 76% of Black adults are more likely to consider starting a side hustle, compared to less than 28% from other communities, the report shows.

“We commissioned this research because we

want to shine alighton the depth of inequityBlack entrepreneurs, and most notably Black women, face as they look to grow their businesses,” says Murray Lambell, Ebay UK’s general manager. “We believe we have a role to play in helping to overcome some of these challenges by helping founders to start and scale their business.”

Ebay is focusing on three main elements within the organisation to boost diversity: the workforce, the workplace and the marketplace, says Gale. It has a partnership with Black Young Professional networkandalsoworkswithColourinTech,anonprofitorganisationaimedat increasing thenumber ethnic minorities entering the UK tech workforce, whichGalesaysisanactionthecompanyistaking to increase its own workplace diversity.

https://www.voguebusiness.com/companies/ebaylaunches-hub-for-black-owned-fashion-beautybrands

Imagecredit: Flickr, whatson.bfi.org.uk

3BlackDot,OneoftheFewBlack-OwnedMediaCompanies

By Harry Miller Source: The Wall Street Journal

Reginald Cash joined 3BlackDot in 2017 and became CEO the following year.Now he has acquiredthe company. Photo: 3BlackDot

THECHIEFEXECUTIVEof3BlackDotHoldings

Inc. has bought the business, making itone of the fewBlack-ownedmediacompaniesatatimewhen many marketers say they want to spend more money with suchenterprises.

Reginald Cash said he acquired 3BlackDot, a media and marketing company focused on videogamers, from French publisher Webedia SA.

The enterprise value of 3BlackDot, including debt, is $87 million, Mr. Cash said, adding that the deal was a combination of cash and a seller note fromWebedia.Withasellernote,theselleragrees to accept part of the purchase price in a series of paymentsmadeover time.

The CEO said he decided to buy 3BlackDot earlier this year after Webedia, a subsidiary of FrenchholdingcompanyFimalacSA,enteredtalks to sellthe media company to a private-equity firm.

Since the protests following the 2020 murder of George Floyd, 3BlackDot has made an effort to work with more Black gamers and members of other underrepresented groups, Mr. Cash said. The company also increasingly pitches itself to CMOs as a way to help their brands appeal to diversegroupsofGenZandmillennialconsumers, he said.

Los Angeles-based 3BlackDot began in 2014 as a talent-management firm helping gaming contentcreatorsearnrevenue.Whilethecompany remains focused on videogames, it has expanded into production and distribution with scripted web series, books, live events and feature films, including 2019’s“Queen& Slim.”

The company said it represents about 100 creators. In recent years it has also collaborated with or signed production deals with celebrities

including director Eli Roth, rapper Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson, Olympic fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad and music duo the Chainsmokers.

Mostof3BlackDot’srevenue,whichtotaledabout $53millionlastyear,comesfromadsales,Mr.Cash said. But its fastest-growing business is arranging brand-integration deals—like a supercharged version of product placement—for clients such as • Netflix Inc.,

• Anheuser-Busch InBev SA’s • Bud Light and • Sony Group Corp.’s • PlayStation.

Mr. Cash said 3BlackDot advises marketers to takealong-termapproachincateringtoaudiences they may have overlooked in the past, rather than aiming for short-term returns on their advertising investments.

“We see a lot of value in those quieter spaces,” he said. “[Marketers] should expect that to be an investment that they need to stickwith.”

Doritos sponsors a 3BlackDot web series, “Gaming While Black,” as part of the PepsiCo Inc. brand’sinitiative“SolidBlack,”whichisinitssecond year and includes funding of $5 million for “Black Changemakers who use innovation and boldness todrivecultureandgivebacktotheircommunities.”

The partnership helps Doritos reach both gamers and young Black consumers, said Stacy Taffet, senior vice president of brand marketing for PepsiCo’s Frito-Lay division. The first season of “Gaming While Black” in 2021 generated more than 100 million paid and earned media impressions, with positive consumer sentimentapproaching100%,shesaid.Paid impressions include various types of ads and paid content promotion, while earned impressions are things like social-media shares, reviews and media coverage.

“Theideafor‘SolidBlack’camefromtelling stories of Black joy, resilience and strength that people want to hear,” Ms. Taffet said. “This was an opportunity to do that through our marketing platform.”

Mr. Cash said 3BlackDot’s future lies in collaborating with the gaming community to create new entertainment properties like the company’s animated web series

“Alpha Betas,” which stars several of the creators on its roster. The company appeals to creators by promising them more creative control and a bigger share of profits than traditional production companies,he said.

Mr. Cash, who earlier in his career was head of investor relations for both UBS Group AG and Deutsche Bank AG, joined 3BlackDot as chief operating officer in 2017 and became CEO the following year. He joins a small group of Black mediaentrepreneursaftermarketersandagencies committed to spending more money with Blackowned businesses.

Other Black media moguls include Byron Allen, ownerofAllenMediaGroup,whorecentlyagreed to acquire Black News Channel LLC out of bankruptcyfor $11 million.

https://canadanewsmedia.ca/ceo-buys3blackdot-making-it-one-of-the-few-blackowned-media-companies-the-wall-streetjournal/#:~:text=Reginald%20Cash%20 joined%203BlackDot%20in%202017%20and%20 became,spend%20more%20money%20with%20 such%20enterprises.%20Reginald%20Cash

Source: https://www.wsj.com/articles/ceo-buys3blackdot-making-it-one-of-the-few-black-ownedmedia-companies-11658746801?mod=business_ minor_pos19

somdirectory.so, hormuud.com

4 Things Good Leaders Do When Facing Obstacles

By Marcel Schwantes, Inc. Contributing Editor/ Founder, Leadership From The Core @MarcelScjeantes

EFFECTIVE LEADERS putasidetheirexpertise

togetthebestoutofcolleagues.Theyheightenthe collective genius of those in their organizations. And in doing so their teams overcome obstacles that,at firstglance, seemed insurmountable.

Ineffective leaders, on the other hand, flex their expertise in the moment. They feel good about theirdecisions,whiletheircolleaguesfeelisolated, unheard, and undervalued. And as a result, their organizations whither away in response to challenges.

To understand the tactics of effective leaders in high-functioning organizations during difficult times,IcaughtupwithDr.RichardWinters,author of You're the Leader. Now What?: Leadership

Lessons from Mayo Clinic.

I asked Dr. Winters what he has seen as an emergency physician, executive coach, and director for leadership development as the most effective tactics ofthe leaders he advises.

Dr. Winters noted four specific things effective leadersdo(and lesseffectiveleadersdon'tdo)as they face obstacles.

1.Effectiveleadersmap theirdecisions.

Ineffective leaders make decisions based on reflexes behind blind spots. They jump to options andwaysforwardbeforeclearlyunderstandingthe problem. They amplify the voices of the powerful few,andsilenceothers. Andtheyfailtoidentifythe bestprocessfordecisions.Thisleavescolleagues disengaged and confused.

Effectiveleadersuseadecision-makingprocess thatbestfitseachdecision'sdomain.Forexample, when challenges are clear and predictable, they leveragebestpracticeandcommonsense. When problems are complicated and expert advice is required, they seek the advice of specialists.And whensituationsarecomplexwithemotionsrunning high,theyunitecolleaguestocreatesharedreality beforedeciding on how to proceed.

2.Effectiveleadersarecoaches, notmentors.

Ineffective leaders mentor. They counsel colleagues based on their own experience. While theirintentmaybehonorable,theydispenseadvice that ignores the differences of their colleague's situation.

"Effective leaders coach," said Dr. Winters. "They view colleagues as experts of their own experience and they challenge and support their colleague's thinking." Additionally, they ask openended questions.They help each colleague make senseoftheworldsotheymayploteffectiveaction from their own unique perspective.

3.Effectiveleadersshinealightonfearsand worries.

"Ineffective leaders ignore the fears and worries of colleagues. They ignore the resistance. They hope it will go away. But it won't," shared Dr. Winters.

Effective leaders shine a light on fears and worries. They acknowledge the resistance and face it head-on. Then, they work with colleagues tofigureouthowtogethertheymightmitigatefears and worries as they move forward.

4.Effectiveleadersembodyorganizational values.

Ineffective leaders speak of organizational values, but do the opposite. They promote teamwork but make decisions alone. They talk of respectbutspeakovercolleagues.Theychampion stewardshipbutspendtheirwayoutofchallenges.

"Effectiveleadersembodyorganizationalvalues. Their behaviors reflecttheir values.They walk the talk, even when things are difficult," stated Dr. Winters, reflecting what I also have seen lacking in theleaders that Icoach.

Effective leadership isn't easy. It means putting aside your expertise, discovering discomfort, and facilitating the best in others. But those leaders who can bring out the best in others, bring out the bestintheirorganizations."Theseare theleaders who elevate exceptional organizations," said Dr. Winters.

https://www.inc.com/marcel-schwantes/4-things-goodleaders-do-when-facing-obstacles-that-bad-leadersdont.html

By Kelly Main, Writer and Adviser @THEKELLYMAIN Edited by DAWN Team

APPLE RECENTLY promised its staff more flexible schedules and more generous scheduling rules, according to CNET. The company effectively is urging workers to follow Steve Jobs's threestep method for discovering breakthroughs and finding answerstodifficult questions.

By asking staff to take more breaks and work less, Apple is helpingnotonlyreduceburnout, but also increase productivity and innovation. In other words, work smarter, not harder. It's something many struggle to do--but something Jobs was a master of, allowing him to find inspiration and discover breakthroughs.And anyone can use it.

Here's the Apple co-founder's three-step method to solving difficult problems:

Step 1. Zoom Out Difficult problems involve difficult-to-find solutions. The process of discovering a breakthrough often requires reality-bending ideas--which Steve Jobs had an incredible ability to do, according to the Harvard Business Review.

While many try to zoom in on a solution, instead start by zooming out to see the bigger picture. This effectively enables you to identify exactly what you're really looking for. To do this, be intentional about what you're looking to discover or achieve.Gooutsidetherealmof what is currently possible, and instead think of terms of what could be possible.

For example, when the first Apple Store opened in 2001, Jobs said its function wasn't to "sell computers," but to "enrich lives," according to Forbes.

Step 2. Focus In

Once you know what you are looking for, give yourself a period of intense thinking and fact gathering. This is where you set your sights on what you want to achieve and work on it relentlessly--something Jobs was an expert at. He famously exhibited an intense and obsessivefocus(orhyperfocus), and it's that ability that made him so effective at motivating employees.

An intense and obsessive focus may be the answer to discovering breakthroughs--no matter which path you take to get there. For example, Albert Einstein famously said, "If I had an hour to solve a problem I'd spend55minutesthinkingabout

the problem and 5 minutes thinking aboutsolutions."

Step 3. Disconnect

Whenyoufindyourselfstarting to go in circles and lacking process on your path toward discovery, take a break. Take a walk.Disconnect.AsSteveJobs once said, you can't connect the dots looking forward--you can do that only when looking backward.

Walking away from something is often when we get clarity and creativity. So taking breaks has a much bigger benefit than a simple break from work, but it actually leads to critical thinking, problem solving, and innovation. For example, Thomas Edison took naps when he couldn't figure out a complex question or equation,hewouldthendiscover the answer he was looking for, accordingtoScientificAmerican. It's why people often have the best ideas come to them while doing mundane activities like driving, sitting on a beach, or taking a shower.

Sometimes you have to get away from your desk to get closer to your answer--one of Jobs's strategies for boosting creativity.PartofwhyJobsloved walking meetings wasn't just that it helped him find answers; it also helped his entire team to get away from their desks and closer to finding their answer and solving whatever problem they wereworking on.

https://www.inc.com/kelly-main/applesteve-jobs-problem-solving.html

Image credit: nicepng.com

By Joe Procopio, Founder, TeachingStartUp.com @JPROCO

"How Useful Is What I Do?"

IT'SAQUESTION thatissosimpleon paper,yet sofreaking difficultto answer in real life.

The usefulness of your product or service is a metricthat'sdifficulttoquantify.Asaresult,alotof entrepreneurs and business leaders don't bother tryingtomeasureitatall.Instead,they'llsubstitute a backward-looking statistic like revenue, or worse, they'll rely on vanity metrics that don't mean anything.

Then they'll find that revenue can suddenly evaporate one day with no explanation. Or they'll use false positives as justification for poor decisions on spend. Either way, the money goes net negative real quick.

Let me assure you that in more than 20 years building and growing companies, I've learned that there is no single answer to any other question that'sgoingtomoreaccuratelypredictthesuccess

Recently,Ipostedabout mission startups versus machine startups. This is my own terminology, but basically a machine startup is one that builds or buys growth around a product, usually by raising money from outside investors. A mission startup follows a more organic path, and grows step by step from a solution. It's slowly builtintoanever-improvingproduct,anddelivered to an ever-expanding market.

While mission startups and machine startups are two completely different beasts, all startups -even machine startups with shedloads of money -- should be built around a single, unwavering mission. It's the reason their solution exists, and therefore also their product and theircompany.

While a machine startup requires venture investment to survive, its product doesn't have to be very useful out of the gate. In fact, a machine startup doesn't even require a working product in the beginning, just the funding to design andbuild a grand machine that will eat a large portion of a market,including allitscompetition.

On the other hand, to be successful, a mission startup's product has to score a nine out of 10 or greater on the utility scale. Without all that rocket

ofyour business. So how doyouanswer it?

TheQuestionIs Really AboutYourBusiness Mission

fueloffunding,amissionstartup'sproductdemand has to be perpetually increasing, itsmarket has to belargeandaddressable,anditsmarginshaveto be thick.

Whether you're building a machine or carrying out a mission, none of that good stuff happens without a product that is maximally useful to a growing number of customers.

AskYourCustomersAboutYourMission

In that same post, I also gave an example of a couple of mission startups I've founded, including the one I'm founding now, Teaching Startup. Its missionisto make more and better entrepreneurs by delivering startup advice affordably.

Now, earlier when I said the utility level of a mission startup's product has to be nine out of 10 or greater, well, after more than two years of building Teaching Startup on the foundation of its mission, I surveyed my customers about its utility.

My first question was to be scored on a scale of 1 to 10.That question:

"Teaching Startup has helped me or will help me build and grow my startup."

And the result was 8.95 out of 10. Close enough.

This question was not worded arbitrarily. I'm not askingifthey'resellingmoreproduct,becausethere are already solutions out there for that, solutions that offer an entirely different value proposition. I'm not asking if my customers feel better about themselves or their leadership, because I'm not trying to make happier and more confident business people. Again, coaching already exists, and it's a completely different valueprop.

No, Teaching Startup exists to advise entrepreneurs on how to build and grow their startups. That's the mission. That's my thesis

You should constantly ask your customers how useful your product is. And you can only get the answer you need by asking the question in a way that speaks directly to whatever mission drives your solution.

UseEngagementtoBackYourMissionThesis

Whenaskedproperly,theutilityanswerisamore important metric than NPS (Net promoter score (NPS) is a widely used market research metric that typically takes the form of a single survey question asking respondents to rate the likelihood that they would recommend a company, product, or a service to a friend or colleague), because brand loyalty rarely moves the revenue needle. And in my opinion, the utility question needs to be answered before measuring engagement, because that engagement might not be engaging for the right reasons.

I'm sure you've spent plenty of time using products and services for no other reason than you weren't inclined to make a change. Yet. But then when that change became inevitable -- think flip phone to smartphone, or cable to streaming -there wasno going back.

The cable company I left five years ago still sends mean NPS survey.

Once you've established usefulness, measuring engagement takes on a whole new meaning. Not only will your results tell you where to make your product better, faster, and stronger, but you'll also know why -- which leads to lighter spend for more customer value.

You won't be adding features they don'twant, or selling to customerswho don'tcare.

https://www.inc.com/joe-procopio/the-secret-tobuilding-a-successful-lasting-business.html

Image credit: http://ariesrules.blogspot. com/2011/11/weekend-humor_11.html

4 Questions Venture Capital Investors Will Ask in Your Pitch (and How to Answer Them)

By Kevin Forestell

PITCHING YOUR STARTUP to a venture capitalist (VC) investor can be intimidating. You're speaking to exceptionally smart, successful individuals in a competitive market. According to Statista, 2021 set a new record for venture capital investments in the U.S. at approximately $330 billioninvested—nearlytwiceasmuchastheyear before.You'recompetingagainstacrowdof clever founders and amazing ideas. How can you best prepare for success?

Consider the perspective of the VC. With such a widerangeofinvestmentopportunitiesandpitches, VCs typically have a set of criteria they look for to help themselves evaluate an opportunity. Think aboutwhatyouwouldwanttoknowasaprospective investor and build yourpitchfrom there.

The team at Chagrin Valley Soap and Salve realized they had to pair their high-quality, organic body-care products with a sustainable packaging strategy. And they did justthat.

Evenstartupswithfantasticideascanfumblethe pitch before it even starts. Think of the following questions as you prepare your next pitch

What problem does your startup solve for consumers?

Investors want to invest in innovative products or services with competitive, long-term potential. Successful pitches share solutions to real-world problems that have yet to be solved by other companies inthe market.

Consider who absolutely needs to have or use your product. Are you pitching something that consumers can't do without? What makes your

product different and better from others? Are you providing people withacompelling reason to change their current habits?

If consumers are currently using a different product or service why willtheyswitchtoyourideainstead?Thinkcritically about the answers to these questions and include them clearly in your pitch. Answer the tough questionsforinvestorsbefore theyevenask them.

Why is now the best time?

Investors will likely want to know why now is the best time to invest in you, from both a market perspective andthe currentstage of your startup.

Investorswillneed toseethatyour targetmarket is currently substantial enough to generate a large return and be sure that you'll be able to capture a substantial piece of that market. Why will your idea work now and why hasn't it worked before? Showing that your business will target an existing market opportunity is crucial for gaining venture capitalists' attention.

In relation to timing within your organization, VCs will need to know what growth and revenue milestones you will hit and when you will hit them. They will also want to see proof that the business is a viableone, withtraction in your core market.

Be prepared to provide this information in a

detailed andrealistic timeline toinvestors.

What makes you the best leader for your idea?

Your story simply has to figure prominently in anysuccessfulpitch.Atthisstage,VCsare mostly investing in the people behind the idea. A strong, determined leader with a clear vision for their idea is imperative.

Include proof of your prior success in your pitch. In addition to a proven track record, VCs want to see confidence in your pitch. Prepare your pitch to showcase your best attributes, including your drive, passionand presence.

Transparency is crucial throughout the entire pitch process but especially now. It's okay to be vulnerable. No one entrepreneur is strong in every area — it's better to be honest about your weaknesses and your plan to hire strategically to help fill out those gaps.

Furthermore, demonstrate your coachability in yourpitch.BeopentolisteningtotheVCsadvising

you and your company — they are successful for a reason.

Doyouhavetheteamtoexecute yourvision? Inadditiontoyouasaleader,VCs need to see the executive team as awhole.Bereadytosharethatyou notonlyhaveauniqueidea,butthe right teambehind you to pull itoff. Be ready to talk about your team's expertise and share a list of qualified,capablepeoplewhowillplaykeyrolesin the company's development. If you don't yet have this team be prepared to share a thorough hiring plan.Furthermore,VCswanttoseethatyourteam isdeterminedtogetthroughthechallengesahead, with a sharedvision for success.

It's also crucial to address the balance of your team. Do you have a marketing expert? Product guru? Sales leader? Address any existing imbalances in team expertise and be ready with a plan to fill those gaps. Demonstrate that you are a smart, strategic founder in the way you build out your core team. Remember that VCs aren't just investing in your business — they're investing in the people,too.

In the end, perhaps the best way to prepare for a pitch meeting is to step into the shoes of your prospective investor. Think about what you would want to know before investing in a company and answer thosequestions clearly in yourpitch.

diasporaltd.com

4 Critical Business Lessons I've Learned as

By Trevor Rappleye

WITHTHEEVER-CHANGINGeconomicclimate, many people are getting into entrepreneurship, which makes sense, because there are several benefits to being a business owner. Running your own company can mean you get the best of both worlds: time and money. As your own boss, you'll get the freedom to schedule your workdays while also achieving financial freedom. Not to mention, you get to create an impact and help others with your business — whowouldn't wantthat?

Nonetheless, being an entrepreneur is no easy feat, and the journey to becoming a successful business owner isn't always straight and smooth. Over the years, I have learned a few key things that have helped myself navigate being an entrepreneur. If you want to become a business owner someday and succeed in any business you start, here are some foundational tips and advice to setyou up for success:

1. Carve out time to sell

As the pilot of your business, the sales — and ultimately, your business's performance — are entirelyuptoyou.Thatsaid,you'renotguaranteed apaycheck.

Many entrepreneurs struggle with prioritizing their time and assignments. Never underestimate the importance of blocking out time to sell like you would block out time for a client meeting. As a general rule of thumb, I recommend blocking out threehourstoselleachday;nocalls,nomeetings, etc. All that to say, it's equally as important to ensure you have a strong, high-quality service to sell to begin with. If you're passionate about what you're selling, and you're committed to catering to yourclients'needs,thensellingwon'tbetedious— it will be fun.

2. Hire a strong team

Sometimes, first-time entrepreneurs fall into the pattern of wanting to do everything themselves. This is a dangerous pattern to sink into. To save time for things like selling and meeting with clients orcustomers,Irecommendhiringastaffpersonto do the everyday tasks and help get the business off the ground. Another key to success is hiring people you trust and allowing them to do their job freely.

Hiringyourfirstemployeecanbescary,butonce you understand that mess-ups are sometimes inevitable,it'llallow youtotakesomeworkoff your

as a CEO

plate and focus. Your team will never get better if you're constantly watching over their shoulders. Hiringa strong team is critical,becauseattheend of the day, you need strong employees to support you and bring in more business. Your employees should have the same mission and vision as you, and they should be committed to the success of the business.

3. Schedule time to learn

Regardless of your industry experience, make learning a lifetime priority. Similar to selling, I advise entrepreneurs to carve out time to learn.

attending leadership conferences, for example. Evenifyoudon'thaveateamormarketingbudget, Iadvisebusinessownerstosetasidesomemoney for marketing.

While learning can look different for everyone — attending conferences, reading books or listening to podcasts, for example — it's crucial to create a schedule that includes time to learn. By setting aside time to learn, you can take a step back and review what's working and not working within your business.

4. You have to spend money to make money

In many cases, money can help you expand — either via marketing, hiring more employees or

Becoming your own boss is a truly rewarding experience. However, a large part of business ownership is trial and error, because after all, you don't know what you don't know. While there are several things you'll have to learn, applying these critical things to your business will increase your chances of success. I'm proud to say that my two companies were able to double their full-time teams, get out of debt, pivot and make it through Covid. We also doubled our video output and tripled our clients throughout 2020 and2021.

My biggest and last piece of advice: You'll never be ready. You'll never be perfect. Just go, and start. Fall down, and then get back up 1,000 times over.Thebestthingsinlifedon'tcomeeasy—and neither does entrepreneurship.

singingforyoursoul.com,

Want to Reach the Best Decision?

Stop and Ask Yourself These Questions First

By Greg Smith

WHEN STAKES ARE LOW,

like how to spend a few hours of downtime, “decision purgatory” can befrustrating.Butwhen lifechanging choices hang in the balance—like whether to buy a house, take a new job, or get married—indecision can have deep and lasting consequences. In a business context, it can also cost millions. A study from McKinsey puts the price of inefficient decision-making at $250 million per year in wasted hours for managers at the average Fortune 500 company.

As a leader, I’ve seen people dragtheirfeet(myownincluded!) on decisions for myriad reasons - lack experience or confidence, wondering if they’re the right person to make the call, succumbing to analysis paralysis, perfectionism, or fear of making a mistake. Those blockers have intensified as economic uncertainty, political unrest, andpandemicweariness have brought many to the brink of burnout.

But focusing on the “predecision process”—which is a simple but often overlooked stage of decision-making—can help. As a leader of a company withhundredsofemployees and more than 50,000 customers, I’ve found that a few essential

pre-game questions lead to faster,betterdecision-making.

“DOIEVENNEED TO DECIDE?”

As a leader, the first question to ask yourself before making a decision is: Do I even need to make it?

Thiscandependonafewbasic factors. First, determine whether the issue actually needs to be debated and decided today. For example, if 50 possible topics areraised in ameeting, handling them as they arise would be overwhelming. You could easily missthereallyimportantdecision that needs to be made today. Instead, focus only on issues that need immediate discussion. Therestcangoina“parkinglot,” to be addressed ata later time.

Next, ask who should make the decision, and whether they actually have the information required to make it. Good decision prep means tasking someone with collecting vital information, and ideally making informed recommendations before you sit down to debate and decide.

Ideally, decisions should be made by the person most directly involved in the work that will be affected. That empowers the people closest

to the issue to solve problems and frees leaders from mucking around in decisions that they are too removed from to make. It also helps train future leaders to make good decisions. Keep in mind that delegation is not abdication—you might need to coach them on how to make good decisions.

These steps, alone, will streamline processes, freeing up bandwidth for more complex and high-stakes decisions while ensuring other issues aren’t lost in the mix.

“WHAT’SREALLYAT STAKE?”

If you’ve concluded that this decision needs to be made now, you have the info you need, and are the right person to make the decision, the next pre-game question to ask is: How high are the stakes?

Forme,thisstartswithasimple evaluation:Isthisdecisionaonewaydoororisiteasilyreversible? Some moves are difficult if not impossible to take back, like having children, moving to a differentcity,oracquiringanother company, so it makes sense to fully explore the options before deciding, and take your time and do deep analysis.

But if it’s something that’s less

permanent, like the messaging on an ad campaign or landing page, or a new product feature, it’sbettertochoosemorequickly since you can readily pivot afterward. Sometimes, you can gettotherightdecision fasterby just pickingonepathquicklyand seeingwhathappensratherthan trying to analyze itallbefore you decide. Plus, making a choice and learning from it provides far more concrete information than any pre-decision analysis usually can.

Anequallyimportantpre-game question: What truly hangs in the balance? You don’t need an eight-page decision brief weighing the pros and cons of extending a successful service contract. At the same time, any leader who makes strategic decisions like acquisitions or annual resource allocations on a whim is in for a bumpy ride. In the end, your process should scale with the magnitude of the decision.

“AMIFREETOFAIL?”

Oneofthebiggestimpediments to quick action is the fear of making a mistake. Many organizations claim to support risk-taking and a willingness to fail. But for this to work, it has to be more than slogans on the wall. What’s needed are concrete processes and policies that valorize decisive execution and protectfrom finger pointing. For example, we hold regular no-blame retrospectives and quarterly reviews. Partly, this is to learn what worked and what didn’t. But equally important is showing that it’s perfectly okay if decisionsdon’tyieldtheintended results.Thiskindofpost-mortem is common among engineering teams at the end of a sprint, but we’ve found it can be applied muchmorebroadly.Likeanyskill, decision-making takes practice. Pre-decision prep work can help accelerate the process, but for organizations and individuals, success ultimately comes down to being willing to make and metabolizemistakes.

How you as a leader speak about mistakes is critical. If you name names, point fingers, and lay blame, you’ll see decisionmaking slow to a crawl. Instead, celebrate the wrong choices and lessons learned from them as much as you do the ones that worked. And when things do work, showcase all the missteps made to get there.

It’s important to point out that this pre-decision matrix is just the start. For those decisions I dodecidetomake,thehardwork stillliesahead:carefullygathering information, evaluating choices, and plotting a course forward. And, often most importantly, ensuring that even those who disagreed get on board with the decision and commit to giving it the best possible chance.

Systems and habits targeting thedecisionsbeforethedecision can helpclearyour plate,freeing upmoretimetomakethechoices that matter, and dispensing with those that don’t.

https://www.fastcompany. com/90780075/want-to-reachthe-best-decision-stop-and-askyourself-these-questions-first?

Image credit: http://ariesrules. blogspot.com/2011/11/weekendhumor_11.html

HowisFirst-Gen HisKnackforLanguages EnterpriseService

By Ben Sherry, Staff Reporter

PGLSFounder&CEOMohamedHussein. Photography by Greg Kahn

I'VE ALWAYS HAD that entrepreneurialmindset.I was the kid selling candy out of his locker and flippingcarsbeforeIcould drive. I graduated from high school two years early, and started college beforeIwas16.Iplannedtogotomedschool,but decided to go to Yemen after my freshman year to study Arabic for a year. I ended up spending about five years in Saudi Arabia, studyingArabic, along with religion and philosophy, at a university there. That's where I became aware of language services as an industry--and a path for me. I needed a job, so I started teaching English on the side. The elite schools in Saudi Arabia were spending a lot of money on English teachers. Eventually, I started a private tutoring business and began traveling around the country to teach English. That was when I started really making money--around $30 an hour.

Once I began making contacts in the language industry, I started getting offerstoworkonalltypes of projects, like book and website translations. I also worked with some major cattle importers in Saudi Arabia to help brokerdealsforsacrificial sheep and goats between the importers and the travel agencies representing American Muslims making the pilgrimage toMecca.

When I got back to the States in 2013, I was sure I didn't want to be a doctor. I had just gotten married and was finally finishing up my degree, and also running an e-commerce platforming company, flipping real estate, consulting, and day trading. But I kept translating on the side.Afriend told me about some contract work translating and interpreting Somali and Arabic, and that's how I originallyfoundedthecompany--asanLLCforthis side gig.

It wasn't until two years later that I thought, "There'ssomethinghere.Letmedoubledownand see what happens." It was then that the business really began to scale. I divested from most of my other commitments so I could focus entirely on growing PGLS. I'd been hiring contractors to handle translation work in languages I wasn't familiar with, and now I was able to hire my first actual employee.

Refocusing my efforts paid off immediately: In 2015, we jumped from making $34,000 to half

First-GenSomaliAmericanTurned LanguagesIntoaGo-To Service

a million dollars. It made sense to initially focus on winning government contracts because of our location, and we had steady growth from 2016 up until 2020. The pandemic was definitely a challenge, but we also won some big federal contracts and acquired a local language training company, resulting in 2021 being our best year ever, by far.

Our mission is to help organizations thrive in a global, multilanguage environment, so we work on everything from marketing materials to training manuals and website copy, but we also help governmentagenciestranslateforeigndocuments and provide linguists. Knowing whom to assign to a specific project is key, because they need to understandthecontext.Ifwe'reworkingforahealth care company,the translator needs to understand the terminology as well as the language. Finding that mix of language mastery and knowledge of the subject matter is what makes our people so impressive.

I'm still keeping myself busy with side hustles, but mostly as a minority shareholder.At the same time, I'm trying to expand my own language knowledge. I'm fluent in English, Arabic, and Somali, but I'd like to have at least five languages in my back pocket, so I'm working on improving my high school Spanish and learning American SignLanguage,whichIthinkwillbeamajorfocus for us going forward. I know from experience that being able to talk directly with a client can go a long wayin strengthening relationships. https://www.inc.com/magazine/202209/bensherry/piedmont-global-language-solutionslanguage-business-mohamed-husseininc-5000-2022.html

By Tommy Mello, Founder, A1 Garage Door USA

Would You Work for a Boss Who's Exactly Like You?

IFYOUWOULD,great.Ifyouwouldn't,it'snotthe end of the world.

The question made me think of the ways I would need to change myself and my business to get to where I wanted to be. Here's what I did, and if you also want to build a team of A-players, you should follow suit.

I wrote down a list of things I need to change or have -- so that I'm the best leader people would love to work for. It's one reason our job posts get filled up quicker than ever (at A1 Garage Door, we now have 400-plus employees).

Buildingagreatteamismucheasierifyou're agreatleader

I've focused on the following things to become a better leader, and hopefully this will help you improveyourleadershipandattractA+talentstoo:

1.Seeyouremployeesasyourmost importantcustomers.

I'devengoonestepfurther:Seeyouremployees as family.

I know that sounds crazy or cheesy, but we've created a family in my business. And I love my A1 Garage Door family. Forexample,I'm makingtime for one-on-one calls with every single employee, even if it's been a challenge to schedule everyone intomycalendar.WealsoassignDreamManagers who help employees with their professional and personal goals.

If you pour your love and affection into your people, they will work for you. They are going to want to win. They are going to want to challenge themselves. And they are going to love coming to work.

Look,alot ofthese peoplearen'tgettingthelove at home.Statistics showthat many Americans are lonely -- and this is especially the case thanks to the pandemic. What if you can get them to "tap dance"toworkeverysingleday,asWarrenBuffett said?

2.Payyouremployees whatyouwouldpay yourself.

Once,a billionaire told mehow to make a million dollars. He had reached the top of his capacities, and he realized that the only way to grow from there was to bring amazing people in and give them equity and profitsharing.

He was stuck. But when he hired people who were better than him, and gave them a share of the business, growth justexploded.

Now, some leaders or founders might feel bad because an employee is making so much money. That does not make any sense to me. Companies make much more money when employees overdeliver. So, if people are getting rich in your organization... it is because theydeserve to. However you choose to pay your employees, here are two tips:

• Tracktheirresultsconsistently: Make sure to pay them for exactly what they are bringing to the table.The metricsneed tobe specific to the individual value they create in your business. I also recommend a performance rating system so you can consistently track their results over time.

• Rewardthemfairly: Don't give them a chunk of what you'vealready made -- give them abig share of what they add to thatvalue instead.

Prove yourcompanyisworthworkingfor Recession or not, there will always be great peoplelookingforabetteropportunity.Istartedmy business during the 2008 recession, and I know that's the case.

Thekeyisshowingthemthatyou,theleader,are capable of delivering on the promise of a better opportunity.

So, how are you going to be the best leader in

Nonkululeko Nyembezi is the First Black Woman Named as Chairman to Africa’s Biggest Lender

By Aria Bendix

THE FINANCE INDUSTRY is tough--it's even tougher for Black women.

In the US, it was found that Black women made up just 2% of the country CFPs (certified financial planners). The numbers are disparate in the finance's global community as well, including South Africa. Fortunately, a recent announcement illustrates a slowlyturning tide.

In May Bloomberg reported that Nonkululeko Nyembezi had been appointed as Chairmandesignate effective. According to a statement, she'd replaced well-respected executive Thulani Gcabashe, who will retire after the annual general meeting onMay 31.

“It is hugely significant to us that the Standard Bank will shortly have its first female chairman, and that this chairman is a black African woman,” Chief Executive Officer Sim Tshabalala said in a statement.

Previously, Nyembezi served as chairman of the JSE Ltd., South Africa’s leading stock exchange, and was previously was the head of steel firm ArcelorMittal South Africa Ltd.

The move moves to usher in a new era for South Africa, as their financial sector has been scrutinized to expand its DEI footprint in boards andexecutiveleadership.AccordingtoBloomberg, PublicInvestmentCorp., the country'sbiggestand most investor, called out Absa Group Ltd., the

NonkululekoNyembezi

third-biggest bank, for choosing acaucasianmanasitscompany head.

“It’s a great, positive step for transformation for the banking sector,” said Nolwandle Mthombeni, a banking analyst at research and consulting firm Intellidex. “Hopefully we can work toward bringing in new and different faces for board appointments in future so that transformation can be even more meaningful.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/ nonkululeko-nyembezi-is-the-first-black-womannamed-as-chairman-to-africa-s-biggest-lender/ ar-AA10z1Kg

Image credit: dut.ac.za, kapitalbiz.co.za

your industry? Write down a list of 10 things and start working on them today!

https://www.inc.com/tommy-mello/1-questionevery-boss-should-ask-themselves.html?utm_

Image credit: http://ariesrules.blogspot.com/2011/11/ weekend-humor_11.html

Why Duolingo is Making Zulu Free to Vodacom’s 45 Million Subscribers

By Faustine Ngila

Duolingo, the US ed-tech firm that specializes in teaching the world how to speak different languages, has now added South Africa’s Zulu language to its catalog.

But rather than focusing on exam fees charges on e-learning sessions, it is partnering with local telco Vodacom which will enable its 45 million subscribers access the language training for free.

Sam Dalsimer, Duolingo’s global head of communications tells Quartz that the focus is on the consumer language learning market and by expanding courses to more diverse languages, Duolingo expectsto help moreconsumersaccess online markets in theirnative languages.

“For this Zulu course launch, we partnered with Vodacom to offer free access to the language learning app for Vodacom’s customers in South Africa,” Dalsimer says. The partnership will see Vodacom make Duolingo a zero-rated app in the country,and eliminate data costs toe-learning.

Theimportanceof theZululanguage

Zulu is the most widely spoken native language in South Africa, with has some 11.5 million home speakers and making it an additional language of instruction on Vodacom’s mobile services is set to popularize it even more.

But developing the Zulu learning course was no meanfeat.Itcamewithauniquesetofchallenges anditslearningscientistshadtocollaborateonthe appwithcoursecontributorsfromNal’ibali,aSouth African literacy organization, to develop ways to teachZuluconcepts.“Thisisdue toZulu’sdistinct three-click consonants, fifteen noun classes, and

the way Zulu words consist of smaller word parts put together,” Dalsimer says.

Many online businessesinAfrica could be losing out on consumers who prioritize their native language or those who find English and French too complex on mobile user interface,especially in rural areas, despite owning smartphones and affording mobile

internet.Topenetratesegmentedmarkets,theuse oflocal languages comes in handy.

In its cultural awareness initiative, Duolingo has trainedover139millionlearnersinthe worldin39 languages since its establishment in 2011. Zulu, whichcurrentlyhas32,000learnersonDuolingo’s platform is the second African languages to be added after Swahili which has 433,000 learners. Swahili, with over 200 million speakers, has been adopted as an official language by 16 African countries.

Xhosa, also SouthAfrican is expected to be the thirdlanguageonthecatalogofAfricanlanguages despite Yoruba, and Igbo (Nigeria) having more native speakers. Zulu and Xhosa are part of the country’s11officiallanguages,andshareasimilar grammatical structure—a combined market of 23.4million people.

Tech hasaroleinculturalpreservation

While Meta is deploying AI to translate 55 African languages, Dalsimer said Duolingo only usesAIto“adaptandpersonalizelessonsforeach

learner” because it wants to use real humans to createcoursecontent.“Wehaveusedtechtohelp revitalize indigenous and endangered languages including Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Hawaiian, and Navajo.”

However, the practice of usingAI in the learning ofAfrican languages is rising, with Google adding 10moreAfricanlanguagestoitsGoogleTranslate AI algorithm. They are Bambara (Mali), Ewe (Ghana, Togo), Krio (Sierra Leone), Lingala (Central Africa), Luganda (Uganda, Rwanda), Oromo(Ethiopia),Sepedi(SouthAfrica),Tigrinya (Eritrea,Ethiopia),Tsonga(SouthAfrica),andTwi (Ghana).

duolingo-is-making-zulu-free-to-vodacoms-45million-subscribers/

Source: https://qz.com/zulu-language-onduolingo-targets-mobile-consumers-1849489157

Image credit: psoft.co.za, youtube.com,e-sa.co

ETHIOPIA'S FIRST

private telecom firm, Safaricom Telecommunications Ethiopia Private Limited Company (PLC), on Thursday launched its mobile telecommunications network and services in Ethiopia.

Safaricom Ethiopia Launches Mobile Telecom

▲ Employeesserve customersatthelaunch of SafaricomEthiopia's networkand services

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Oct.6, 2022. (Xinhua/MichaelTewelde)

Safaricom Ethiopia switchedonitsnetwork and services in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, Thursday following network pilots in 10 cities across the EastAfrican country.

► PeterNdegwa,CEO of SafaricomPrivate Limited Company (PLC),speaks at the ceremony of Safaricom Ethiopia's network and servicesinAddisAbaba, Ethiopia,Oct. (Xinhua/Michael Tewelde)

tomeetthe25%populationcoverageobligationin its license.

Following the launch in the national capital, Safaricom Ethiopia's 2G, 3G and 4G mobile services are available in 11 cities, including the national capital and the country's second-largest city of Dire Dawa.

While speaking during the launch ceremony, Anwar Soussa, chief executive officer (CEO) of Safaricom Ethiopia, described the launch as "a momentous day."

The company further announced its plans to launchservices in atotalof 25cities byApril2023

Safaricom Ethiopia said it is building a whollyownedmobilenetworkand also hasinfrastructure sharing and interconnection agreements in place with Ethio-Telecom, Ethiopia's state-owned telecom company.

Safaricom Ethiopia is owned by an international consortiumincludingVodafoneGroup,Safaricom PLC, VodacomGroup, SumitomoCorporation, and British International Investment (BII) -- the UK's development finance institution and impact investor.

Telecom Network, Services

in

6, 2022.

CEOofSafaricomPLCPeterNdegwaexpressed the company's aspiration to positively impact the people of Ethiopia with a sustainable and quality mobile network that will be a vital launch pad for nationwide digital telecommunications services to Ethiopia, the second most populous country in Africa.

"Weareencouraged,ofcourse,bythemilestones madebySafaricomEthiopiaandwhatthisbusiness willcontributetothecountry'stelecommunications reformanddigitaltransformationbutalsoinclusion objectives," Ndegwa said. "Our intention is to

ensure that everything we do, we do it for the peopleofEthiopiaandforthecountryofEthiopia."

inMay2021tothe Safaricom-ledconsortiumfora license fee of 850 million U.S.dollars.

Ethiopia'stelecomindustryisconsideredahuge untapped market, as the East African country offersone ofAfrica's largesttelecom markets.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/ safaricom-ethiopia-launches-mobile-telecomnetwork-services/ar-AA12IpBP

Brands are Already Making Millions in the Metaverse. Here's What Business Owners Need To Know.

By Ben Sherry, Staff Reporter

IF YOU'RE STILL SKEPTICAL about the metaverse,youcertainlyaren'talone.Accordingto arecentsurvey,55%ofadultswithyearlyincomes over $100,000 said they were not interested or excitedabouttheconcept,while37%saidtheywere primarilyworriedabout it.Only6% ofrespondents claimed to be excited about the metaverse.

Those numbers might not seem encouraging, butit'simportanttorememberthatoneofthemost popular metaverse platforms currently available, Roblox,averagesmorethan54milliondailyusers, the vast majority of whom are Gen-Z or younger. Those users have cumulatively spent more than $1 billion on digital items such as outfits or accessories designed to be worn by player avatars

Kids and young adults nowadays are incredibly literateinsocialmediaandtechnology,andthey've already made their interest in the metaverse clear, says Winnie Burke, senior director of global partnerships at Roblox. In the platform's creation engine, dubbed Roblox Studio, players can use Lego-like digital "blocks" to build virtual worlds from scratch, and then share those worlds online or jump into other environments with their friends. Over 30 million of these virtual worlds have been created so far.

In addition to creating worlds, young people are also showing a keen interest in customizing their virtual appearances. Around 20% of Roblox users change theiravatar'sappearanceonadailybasis, according to Neha Singh, CEO of Obsess, a New York City-based company that builds and designs virtual worlds in the metaverse. Singh added that a recent Obsess survey found that nearly threequarters of Gen-Zers have purchased a digital item for their avatar within a video game. In December 2021, clothing brand Forever 21

launched Shop City, a virtual playground on Roblox where users can shop for virtual clothes and curate their own stores by setting up displays, creatingkiosks, and choosing designs to feature. Forever 21 CEO WinnieParksaysthat the key to engaging youngerconsumersis to create a presence in spaces that they already inhabit and thengivethemtoolsto express themselves.

"We're really trying to focus on becoming more intimate with our Gen-Z target audience, or people from 9 to 22 years old," says Park. "I think it's critically important that the brand exists where that demographic already is,which is on Roblox."

WhileParksaysthatthemaingoalofthecompany's foray into the metaverse was to experiment and create a presence for the brand in spaces already inhabited by Gen-Z, it has also helped drive sales: In the Shop City Roblox experience, Forever 21 created a virtual black beanie hat that proved so

popular the company will physically produce it and sell it in their stores. According to Park, the virtual beanie is one of the company's bestselling itemsof all time, and is on track to sellover 1.5 million units in themetaverse.

Anotherreasontotryoutthemetaverseyourself: Gen-Z highly values authenticity. If young people feel that the only purpose of your metaverse experience is to sell them things, you could risk damaging your brand. Park says that brands shouldusethemetaverseprimarilyasawayof

building brand loyalty, which in turn can lead tosales.

But how can brands direct users who aren't already brand-loyal to their virtual experiences? BurkesaysthatRobloxisworkingonimplementing sponsored searchresults and a recommendations system that will allow brands to more efficiently reach their intended demographic.

Entrepreneurs who are interested but skeptical about the metaverse should download Roblox on their phonesandexperiment,according toPark."I think you have to experience it directly in order to go, 'Okay, I understand the parameters of what I can do here, and here's what I think I want to do.'"

https://www.inc.com/ben-sherry/roblox-forever-21metaverse-e-commerce.html?utm=newsletters

Image credits: https://landing.upland.me, youtube. com, arketyp.com

IN POST-PANDEMIC TIMES, staying creative and productive without sacrificing your health and well-being is critical. If you can't take care of yourself first, how do you expect to thrive in your work orlife?

Evenmoreimportantisbeingabletotakecareof yourbrain--thatpartofyouthatcontrolseverything you do. When it's functioning at a high level, like being in a state of flow, it's magical.

The best thing of all? Anyone can train his or her brain to improve its cognitive function to thinkbetterandmoreclearly,experiencemore insight,andhavemorecreativebreakthroughs

Here are four things you can do for a more productive and imaginative brain.

1.Put yourself inunfamiliar places

Want to experience more sudden bursts of creativity and insight? Research suggests the surest way to provoke the imagination is to seek out environments you have no experience with. Booking your next corporate offsite at a typical conference room in your typical five-star hotel doesn't create an environment that leads to new insights. Instead, new breakthroughs come from new people and new environments -- any circumstance in which the brain has a hard time predicting whatwillhappen next.

2.Daydream

The book Imagine: How Creativity Works teaches us to access right-brained thinking as the gatewayformoreinnovative thoughtsandcreative breakthroughs. One suggested brain hack in the book is to rid yourself of intense focus--a leftbrain activity that can trigger stress and hamper your imagination. Instead, the research suggests allowing for more abstract ideas to take shape (a right-brain activity), which will release more creative insight. One way to do that is to practice

4 Odd Brain Hacks That Will Supercharge Your Creativity

By Marcel Schwantes, Founder, Leadership From The Core

"productive daydreaming" while doing something relaxing. Think how many times you've come up withsomethingbrilliantout of the blue while taking ahotshower orbath.

3.Giveemployeessomefreedomtodowhat they want

Researchers have determined that employees who are given time during the workday to do whatever they want--whether it's a side project or simply tinkering with something new or a hobby-arefarmorelikelytodevelopinnovativeorcreative thoughts. This sends an important message that the employer trusts their workers to find solutions and managetheir timein their own way.

4. Let peopleplay

Researchers found that people who have fun on the job are more creative and productive, make better decisions, and get along better with colleagues. They also are much less likely to call in sick or show up late to work than people who aren'thavingfun.Tounlockyourcreativepotential, one study at the University of Toronto suggests hacking the brains of your employees with more playactivitiestolifttheirmoodandgenerateideas. Studies also say that a culture of fun can improve work quality and mental health in five different ways:

• Fun breaks up boredom and fatigue.

• Fun fulfills human social needs.

• Fun increases creativity and willingnessto help.

• Fun improves communication.

• Fun breaks up conflictandtension.

Image credits:

YouTubeandInstagramJoinTikTokwith NewSocialCommerceTools

By Rebecca Deczynski, Staff Reporter, Inc

IF YOU HAVEN'T brought your retail business intotheworldofsocialcommercejustyet,consider thisyour cue.

This month, both Instagram and YouTube unveiled new tools that aim to help users make sales directly on their social media platforms -removingtheneedtoshopatabrand'sownwebsite or retailer's online store. With the more seamless check-out options, presumably consumers will have fewer barriers to buy, and that can lead to more sales.

On Instagram, customers can now place and track orders in direct messages, and sellers can request and receive payment in the same thread using Meta Pay. This feature aims to simplify the purchase process, especially for custom orders that might require back-and-forth communication between buyer and seller, according to Meta, the Menlo Park, California-based owner of Instagram and Facebook. Previously, businesses could sell items on Instagram through the app's shop function, but shoppers could not place orders through direct messages. Businesses must have an Instagram storefront to use the newtool.

ThroughanewpartnershipwithShopify,YouTube creatorscannowdirectlylinktheirproductsacross theirchannelsandcontent,includinginlivestream videos.U.S.-basedusersofthefeaturecanenable onsitecheckout,whichcanallowshopperstomake purchases directly on YouTube. To use the new shopping feature, YouTube creators must have more than 1,000 subscribers and must have their channel approved for monetization. "I predict that this will heavily impact my conversion rate, which will help more people give my products and my brand a chance to become part of their everyday life," Cassey Ho, founder of the Pilates brand Blogilates,said ina press releaseannouncing the Shopifypartnership.

These updates are just the latest in a growing trend towards social commerce. In November,

Pinterest launched a live shopping series dubbed Pinterest TV. And last summer, TikTok unveiled inapp shopping integrations through Square and Shopify. In 2021, sales made through social media hit an estimated $492 billion -- and experts predict that number will grow to $1.2 trillion, according to a report fromAccenture.

Thebestwaytocapitalizeon the trend is to start now and skipthehardsell.Whileoptions will vary for different kinds of products, demographics, and social platforms, one thing remains consistent across platforms: authenticity. "It's really about making it feel organic and not trying to tell people to buy the product -- it's more about presenting the option for them to do so," Maria Wilkes, founder of the London-based brand Candid Beauté, previously told Inc. about using Shopify's integration on TikTok.

Africa’s Payments Startups are about to Face Competition from a Brazilian Unicorn

By Alexander Onukwue

A DECADE AFTER STARTING operations in Brazil, payments provider EBANX has grown into a billion-dollar company with around one billion transactions completed in 15 countries. It carved a niche by helping global companies like Spotify, and Uber receive payments from customers living in Latin America. Last October, it filed documents for an initial public offering in the US, though the process has slowed down due to the ongoing economicdownturn.

ForitsnextmoveandfirstvoyageoutsideofLatin America, EBANX is launching in Africa, beginning with Kenya, Nigeria, and SouthAfrica

The move seeks to tap into Africa’s rising digital economy driven by the rise of fintech companies like Flutterwave, MFS Africa, and OPay. João Del Valle, CEO and co-founder of EBANX, drew parallels between Africa’s present fintech momentum and the state of play in Latin America in 2012 whenhis companylaunched.

But while Africa’s fintech-powered digital economyisfastgrowing,itis“onlyinitsearlydays, andit’sprojectedtogrowupandtotherightforthe

nextfew decades,”Del Valle said, in a statement. Whatattractsa Brazilian fintechtoAfrica?

Atleast initsfirst year,EBANXwill likely operate not as a disruptor of African fintech but as a student and potential partner of strong local players.ItplanstolearnfromM-Pesa’subiquityin Kenya, and OZOW’s capabilities in electronic fund transfers in South Africa. In Nigeria, the use of USSD—allowing ease of access for those without smartphones—andbanktransferswillbeitstarget.

These three countries make up half of Africa’s GDP and are Africa’s largest markets for fintech, with varying degrees of penetration of digital paymentsmethods.SouthAfrica,wheretheuseof cashine-commerceisjust9%,couldbeEBANX’s mostinterestingmarket.Butitcanexpecttosquare up with incumbents like Yoco, which has grown fromofferingpaymentterminalstoprocessingweb payments, and Stripe-owned Paystack.

But the Brazilian company can summon experience gained from Latin America’s decadeold head starton African fintech.

Beyond a flattering “next frontier” rhetoric, Africa

appeals to EBANX because developing economies share similar challenges with brick-and-mortar financial systems designed for a past age. Indeed, some SouthAmericanstartupshave become inspiration forAfrican startups in similar industries.

A good case is Nubank, the world’s most valuable digital bank thatis a modelfor Kuda, oneofNigeria’sdigitalbanking startups. The similarities have also seen African startups expandtoBrazil,oneinstance

being Migo’s export of its creditas-a-service business built in Nigeria.

Far from being an Amazonsize juggernaut destined to win inAfrica,EBANXhashadtofight for distinction in South America in the face of competition from dLocal, the Nasdaq-listed Uruguayan payments company. EBANX laid off a fifth of its employees in June to adjust to the current economic climate, despite raising $430 million in January 2021.

Still, its ambition is to float

products (including new ones announced this week) in Africa that will “build the digital economy at a rapid pace,” said Paula Bellizia, EBANX’s global payments head, in a statement. Its motivation? A cash-dominant Africa is still scratching the surface on fintech penetration and growth.

THE AFRICAN CONTINENTALFree Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement, ratified in 2021, is a landmark milestone for the African continent. The past two-and-a-half years have underlined the need for cohesive, interconnectivity, and unity in ourever-changingworld.Thepitfallsofthecovid-19 pandemic, the looming climate catastrophe, and general economic strife, make collaboration more importantnow than ever.

Expected outcomes of the agreement include greater regional economic integration and a more significant contribution by African countries to global trade. AfCFTA will cover a population of 1.3 billion people and an annual $3.4 trillion annual economic output. Fully implemented, it is estimated the agreement could boost the region’s income by $450 billion annually, and provide new opportunities including agriculture, manufacturing, and e-commerce.

It is not only industries such as transport and manufacturing, though, that will stand to benefit. A pillar of Africa’s economy, as well as its identity lifeblood, lies in the unique and varied cultural sectors. WiththelaunchofAfCFTA,thecultural economy is one sector that should be a significant focus given its potential to provide additional value to the economic growth and developmentof Africancountries.

HowImportantisAfrica’sCulturalEconomy?

The cultural economy includes fashion, arts and crafts, cinema, visual, and performing arts, culinary arts, sports, and tourism. If AfCFTA is properly implemented, these sectors can benefit from the stated goals of AfCFTA, particularly around boosting the competitiveness of different industries, and policy changes that enable innovation and entrepreneurship.

Among the top objectives of AfCFTA is to improve intra-African trade through harmonization and easing the movement of people, goods, and services. Historically, intra-African trade has been low, with most trade-oriented towards other regions of the world. Intra-African trade stands at just15%,comparedto67%forEuropeand61%for Asia according to the United Nations Conference on Tradeand Development(Unctad.) AfCFTAhas come at a timely period, with much opportunity to change this trajectory.

How AfCFTA Can Cultural Economy

By meron demisse

The cultural economy can support greater intraAfrican trade and broader regional integration through more Africa-driven cultural exchanges, programs,andproducts.Whilethepandemicposed challenges to the takeoff of AfCFTA, the mutual benefits for the trade agreement and the cultural economy are clear. Successful implementation would allow African countries to further project a positive brand of the regionathome and abroad.

As an example, Africa’s fashion industry has grown to $31 billion in value in recent years With the expected reduction of tariffs and barriers expected to reduce the costs of trade, Kenya’s largest textile factory is positioning itself to take advantage by boosting its manufacturing capacity and creating new jobs.

By enforcing rules of origin, the trade agreement seekstospurmorelocallymanufacturedproducts, includingtextiles.Asuccessfullyimplementedtrade agreement complemented with other investments in fashion could benefit Africa’s textile industry, generating$15.5billionoverthenextseveralyears.

Amorecompetitivefashionindustry,strengthened byAfCFTA,investmentsininfrastructure,regulatory reforms,andzerotariffsforAfricanproducts,could not only strengthen intra-African trade but also potentially lift Africa’s share of the global fashion industry in the longer term.

AfricantourismandtheAfricanpassportInrecent years, intandemwiththeoverallpushforAfCFTA, effortsinthetourismsectorhavefocusedonAfrican countries liberalizing their visa requirements, resulting in more countries permitting visa-free accesstoAfricantravelers.

A highly anticipated, but as of yet, unrealized, single passport for Africans could potentially ease travel to all African nations in line with the Africa Union Agenda 2063 and AfCFTA. The trade agreement is expected to benefit the travel

Boost Africa’s Economy

demisse

sector by boosting local travel by Africans for both business and tourismpurposes.

DigitizationinAfrica

AfCFTA has incentives for digital technology and innovation that could prove beneficial to the cultural economy. For example, for e-commerce, the trade agreement may foster the growth of advertising andthesaleofgoodsthroughonline marketplaces.Localdigitalplatforms for online transactions stand to benefit from these developments.

Benefits for the cultural economy could also include increased trade in products such as arts and crafts and services, for example streaming locally produced movies from Nollywood through digital technology platforms.

AfCFTA could further enhance the surge in mobile traffic and data consumption, particularly online video content for entertainment, due to reductions in cost that could lead to wider access. This would support the pre-pandemic projection that the value of mobile data consumed in Africa would reach $27 billion in 2021 (pdf).

IntellectualProperty

Standardized intellectual property protocols inspiredbyAfCFTAtoprotecttraditionalknowledge and cultural expression, will provide incentives to foster innovation and entrepreneurship in the cultural economy across African countries.

An extensive range of innovative products and services may benefit from AfCFTA, from digital to cultural textiles to agricultural products. African countries can push for policies at the national level and through multinational bodies to protect culturallyproducedgoodsfromtheregion,suchas the staple teff from Ethiopia and fonio from west

African countries. For example, inspiration can be drawnfrom emulating theefforts of theColombian CoffeeFederationtobrandandregisterColombian coffee.

RethinkingAfrica’sCulturalEconomy

Africancountriesneedtorethinkhowthecultural economy can project the region’s soft power. The privatesectorandgovernmentsacrosstheAfrican region can play an important role in championing and providing financial support for Africa-wide culturalprogramming,inspiredbyAfCFTA’sgoalof greater regional integration.

These activities would serve to engage the public, and further build on the concept of panAfrican identity. As AfCFTA becomes a reality, there are additional challenges that will be faced, suchasoverlappinggeopoliticalintereststhatmay not align with AfCFTA. But with the right support from leaders across the business, policy, and culturalsector,AfCFTAhasthepotentialtoelevate the impact of the cultural economy.

Development LinkedIn Rolls Out New Tools to Give Creators More Ways to Share Visual Content

By Aisha Malik

LINKEDIN ANNOUNCED RECENTLY

thatit’srollingoutnewfeaturesforcreators that are designed to make it easier to sharevisual contentonthesocialnetwork. The launch marks LinkedIn’s latest effort toward building out a platform for creating content and courtingcreators.

In the coming weeks, creators on LinkedIn will be able to add a clickable link directly onto their images and videos to drive traffic to their websites or other resources, regardless of whether they’re onoroffLinkedIn.Forexample,thecompanynotes thatcreatorscanusethenewfeaturetolinktotheir mostrecentnewslettersortheirpersonalwebsites. You can add a clickable link by tapping the “Add a link” icon after creating a new post on mobile with an image or video.

Thecompanyisalsolaunching anewTemplates featurethatisdesignedtohelpcreatorsensurethat their text posts will stand out in users’ feeds. The Templates are designed to give text posts a pop of color to make them more visually pleasing and eye-catching for viewers. Creators will be able to accessthenewTemplatesinthecomingweeksby going to the share box or tapping “Post”on mobile and then selecting “Use a template.” From there, you can choose from numerous customizable backgrounds and fonts, add your own text and hit “Share.” You can even add a clickable link onto templates.

In addition, LinkedIn has starting rolling out “Carousels,” which is a new content format that allows you to mix images and videos when presenting information to your followers in a swipeable format. LinkedIn says users will start seeingcarouselsintheirFeedtoday.Thecompany plans to tweak the feature and release it more widelylater this year.

The launch of the new features comes as LinkedIn says it’s seen a 20% increase year over year in people adding visual content in their posts. LinkedIn has ramped up efforts to court creators to its platform over the past year and even launched a $25 million creator fund in September 2021. When LinkedIn launched the fund, the idea of starting a fund to incentivize creators to build video for a particular platformwasn’texactlynew, consideringplatforms such as TikTok, Instagram and Facebook had all announced hundreds of millions of dollars in

Although LinkedIn has 830 million users, it houses content that is vastly different from what you find on TikTok and Instagram. However, that hasn’t stopped the platform from trying to court creators and position itself as a home for creating content.

Now comes the latest iteration in that effort. To bring more creators to the platform, the company today announced that it would be launching a new $25 million creator fund, which initially will be focused around a new Creator Accelerator Program.

It’s coming on the heels of LinkedIn also continuingtoworkon oneofitsother new-content experiments: a Clubhouse-style live conversation platform. As we previously reported, LinkedIn began working on this back in March of this year. Now, we are hearing that the feature will make an appearance as part of a broader events strategy for the company very soon.

LinkedIn $25 Million Creator Fund

WHEN LINKEDIN first launched Stories format, andlaterexpandeditstoolsforcreatorsearlierthis year, one noticeable detail was that the Microsoftowned network for professionals hadn’t built any kind of obvious monetization into the program — noticeable, given that creators earnalivingonotherplatforms like Instagram, YouTube and TikTok, and those apps had lured creators, their content and their audiences in part by paying out.

“As we continue to listen to feedback from our members as we consider future opportunities, we’ll also continue to evolve how we create more value for our creators,” is how LinkedIn explained its holding pattern on payouts to me at the time. But that strategy may have backfired for the company — or at least may have played a role in what came next: last month, LinkedIn announced it would be scrapping its Stories format and going back to the proverbial drawing board to work on other short-formvideo content for the platform.

“We’ll be starting to test audio with a small pilot group in the coming weeks,” said Chris Szeto, senior director of product at LinkedIn, who heads up its audio efforts. “Given the trends in virtual, hybrid events we are also working on making audiopartofouroveralleventstrategyratherthan a standalone offering, so that we can give people more choice about how they want to run and engage with theiraudiences.”

Notably, in a blog post announcing the creator fund, LinkedIn also listed a number of creator events coming up. Will the Clubhouse-style feature pop up there? Watch this space. Or maybe… listen up.

In any case, the creator accelerator that LinkedIn is announcing today is part of a bigger effort it’s been making to build out a platform for creating content. That has included building new tools and acquiring companies like Jumprope (a platform devised to make “how-to” videos) earlier this year. Together with the accelerator, the idea that LinkedIn wants to encourage more dynamic and lively set of voices to get more people talking and spending timeon LinkedIn.

Andrei Santalo, global head of community at LinkedIn,notedintheblogpostthattheaccelerator/ incubator will be focused on the many ways that

LinkedIn from page 39

one can engage on LinkedIn.

“Creating content on LinkedIn is about creating opportunity, for yourselves and others,” he writes. “How can your words, videos and conversations make 774+ million professionals better at what they do or help them see the world in new ways?”

The incubator will last for 10 weeks and will take on 100 creators inthe U.S. tocoach them on buildingcontent for LinkedIn. Itwill also give them chances to network with like-minded individuals (naturally… it is LinkedIn), as well as a $15,000 grant to do their work. The deadline for applying (which you do here) is October 12.

The idea of starting a fund to incentivize creators to build video for a particular platform is definitely not new — and that is one reason why it was overdue for LinkedIn to think about its own approach.

Leading social media platforms like TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram and Facebook andYouTube allhaveannouncedhundredsofmillionsofdollars in payouts in the form of creator funds to bring more original content to their platforms.

You could argue that for mass-market social mediasites,it’simportanttopaycreatorsbecause competitionissofierceamongthemforconsumer attention.

But on the other hand, those platforms have appeal for creators because of the potential audience size. At 774 million users, LinkedIn isn’t exactly small, but the kind of content that tends

to live on there is so different, and maybe drier — it’s focused on professional development, work and “serious” topics — that perhaps it might need the most financial incentive of all to get creators to bite.

LinkedIn’s bread and butter up to now has been aroundprofessionaldevelopment:peopleuseitto lookforwork,togetbetterjobs,tohirepeople,and to connect with people who might help them get ahead in their professional lives.

But it’s done so in a very prescribed set of formatsthatdonotleavemuchroom forexploring “authenticity” — not in the modern sense of “authentic self”, and not in the more old-school sense of just letting down your guard and being yourself. (Even relatively newer initiatives like its education focus directly play into this bigger framework.)

Withauthenticitybecominganincreasingpriority for people — and maybe more so as we have started to blur the lines between work and home because ofCOVID-19andthechangesthatithas forced on us — I can’t help but wonder whether LinkedIn will use this opportunity to rethink, or at least expand the concept of, what it means to spend time on its platform.

https://techcrunch.com/2021/09/14/linkedin-islaunching-its-own-25m-fund-and-incubator-forcreators/

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/ linkedinforcreators/

Image credit: LinkedIn China viaWeibo

Opportunities

the world,almostallofwhichcanbe auditedat no cost.

https://www.zdnet.com/article/samsung-develops-

Samsung announced that it has developed a new toilet that recycles and safely disposes of human waste in collaboration with the Bill & MelindaGates Foundation.

The company's advanced research arm Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology had been working with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation since 2019. The institute recently completed the development of core technologies and made a prototype of the toilet that has gone through a user test, Samsung said.

According to the South Korean tech giant, the toilet, aimed for household use that meets the performance requirements of the foundation, comes with heat-treatment and bioprocessing technologies to kill pathogens from human waste and the released material is safe for the environment.

The treated water can be fully recycled, while thesolidwasteisdriedandcombustedtoashand the liquid waste is purified, Samsung said. The company added that it plans to offer licenses of patents related to the toilet for free to developing countries during commercialization.

That’sthecatch,thoughit’sasmallone.Auditing a course means you miss out on tests, quizzes, and certain course materials. However, you can pay in order to get real-life course credit. But if you’re looking to absorb and retain material, and don’tmind not betested onit, thisis a great place to start.

COURSERA:2,500+FREECOURSES

Coursera is similar to EdX, although it does havea dedicated free courses section.Compared to EdX, Coursera skews a bit more toward professional training, but it’s likely you’ll be able to find a fair amount of overlap if you look hard enough.

CODECADEMY:100+FREECODING COURSES

Looking to try your hand at programming? Spin up a free Codecademy account. Then, on its catalog page, scroll down to the “Most popular courses”sectionandfilterthedropdownsubmenu to selectfree courses.

Althoughthere’snooverarchingfreesectionthat shows you every single freebie. Once you find a coding discipline that really speaks to you, you candrillintoitfromtheleft-handnavandfilterfree courses similarly.

UDEMY:500+FREE COURSES

Udemy’s free courses section offers a nice mix of professional development, coding classes, and classes that teach you new skills, such as how to take better photos or learn a particular software product.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90784573/best-free-

Here’s a shortlist of thousands of free online courses from some of the big-name education waypoints around the web. You’ll find everythingfromstraightforwardcollegecoursesto professionaldevelopmenttolearningnewhobbies.

EDX:3,600+FREECOURSES

This site’s raison d’être: serving up online courses from top collegesand universities

If you’re interested in real-world learning from people working inside various industries—not necessarilyprofessors,inotherwords—thenyou’ll likely find what you’re looking for here. You can even signup to teach classes yourself ifyou’rean expertinyourfield.

USTDA and the Government of Botswana have

renewed a longstanding partnership to develop high-quality infrastructure for the people of Botswana. In a Memorandum of Understanding signed last week, USTDA and Botswana’s Public Procurement Regulatory Authority agreed to cooperate onthe deliveryoftraining andtechnical assistance to the country’s public procurement officials under USTDA’s Global Procurement Initiative: Understanding Best Value. USTDA also committed grant funding for technical assistance to support PPRA’s implementation of new national public procurement regulations designedtostrengthenthequalityof the country’s infrastructure.

HowThis Chinese Immigrant Removed the Pain--and Expense -of Getting a Green

By Melissa

Director Ebong joined friends and colleagues at the Inaugural Virginia African Diaspora Heritage Month Celebration in Manassas, VA on September 25th. The committee and members of the Virginia Legislature led by Delegate MichelleL.Maldonadohelped spearhead the passage of Bill HJ 133 to commemorate African diaspora heritage every September. The Commonwealth is home to more than 115,000 Virginian members of the African Diaspora and has generated more than $205 million in international trade

The African diaspora is an essential partner for USTDA and for Africa – it brings a particular brand of expertise that nobody else has and offers unique paths for strengthening the U.S.-Africa relationship.

LIKE MANY IMMIGRANTS, I had lived my entire life inAmerica with thisassumption that immigration is supposed to be hard. It never crossed my mind that there was a different way, because everyone has been suffering from the same set of bureaucracies and challenges for generations. When I started Boundless Immigration, I wanted to better understandthespecificpainpointscustomers were experiencing.

Iinterviewedhundredsofimmigrantfamilies, along with attorneys and government and policy officials, and I discovered that legal immigration is challenging largely because of a major information gap. The only two groups that are truly knowledgeable--the government and immigration attorneys--benefit from the status quo.

The application packages are upwards of 400 pages, so there's a lot of stress in putting them together. Before Boundless, families looking for help often had to choosebetweenanexpensiveimmigration attorney or an unlicensed consultant, with no guarantee of outcomes. My family spent multiple months of income to get our green cards to stay in this country, and my dad was constantly taken advantage of at his work, because they knew that if he left his job he'd jeopardize his greencard.

This sort of problem is precisely what technologyanddatacansolvebydemocratizing information and services. Fortunately, I had beentalkingaboutallthiswithastartupcalled Pioneer Square Labs. To quickly get a grasp on customers wanted, we created webpages

Immigrant Expense

Green Card

Melissa Angell

that promoted different types of services. I then was able to talk to customers and understand their needs. By the time I actually started hiring a team and buildingtheproduct,Ihadastrong view of what could work, because we'd already tested multipleiterations with real people.

When we launched, I wore many hats. My personal cellphone number was listed as our customer support line, so I would receive calls at all hours with questions about our service. That was greatinput.

We'vealsotakenmanywrongturns.Inmid-2018, we were trying to acquire customers through paid marketingonFacebookandGoogle.Unfortunately, becauseofcompetitionfromattorneysadvertising, our customer acquisition cost grew to over $800, sowewerelosingsignificantmoneypercustomer.

We had been investing in content marketing and SEO, but it was unclear what the ROI would be and how long it would take. We wereabout a year awayfromrunningoutofmoneyifwecouldn'tturn it around. Finally, that August, our organic traffic exceeded our paid traffic for the first time. From then on, it just snowballed, from 100,000 unique visitorsamonthtoover1.5millionnow,makingus the most popular immigration website outside of the federal government.

We've helped process more than 70,000 successful applications, and we have a 99.97% approval rating. We turned a process that took weeks and months into something that takes a couple of hours to complete online. The majority of our customers are filing for fiancé visas or marriage green cards, which tend to cost more than temporary travel or visitor visas. Compared withtypicalimmigrationattorneyfeesofmorethan $3,000, our fees for helping with these visas are $995.Thisisn'tlikeotherpurchasesthatallowyou tohaveado-over. Yougetoneshotatproducing an application that can change the course of yourlife.

During our time as a company, we've been through a presidential administration that was basically tweeting out immigration changes on Fridaynights,andthenaglobalpandemicthatshut down immigration, migration, government, and processingacrosstheworld.It'satestamenttothe team's resilience that we take on each challenge androllwithit.It'struethatstartupssucceedwhen you refuse to die.

https://www.inc.com/magazine/202209/melissaangell/boundless-immigration-system-data-xiaowang-inc-5000-2022.html

Image

Meron Menghistab, badcredit.org

XiaoWang, CEOofBoundlessImmigration.

Building a City of the Future

ZIM CYBER CITY is a state-of-the-art, mixeduse development project. Sprawled across a 2.5 million square foot space, it is currently under construction in Mount Hampden, New Harare MountHampden’smasterplan includes thenewly completed Parliament building andallthe ministry buildings as well as high-end residential and commercial buildings. Many compare this to the DowntownandSheikhZayedRoaddevelopments in Dubai, UAE. The land is a grant from the government to the master developers Mulk International.

Additionally Zim Cyber City will offer a high standard of living and affluent community.Aworld classduty free mall and highend residential living offering Pre-approved mortgages from Banks in USD. This is a huge benefit as Banks do not provide pre-approved mortgages in the country. Adding in your tax free investments and 24/7 advanced built in surveillance technology that is directly connected to law enforcement authorities formaximumsecurityofresidents.NowonderZim Cyber City is touted asAfrica’s most exciting real estate project.

MULKINTERNATIONAL

MulkInternationalisamultinationalconglomerate with diversified business interests spanning primarilyfoursectors–BuildingMaterials,Plastics, HealthcareandCricketAssets.Formorethantwo decades, Mulk International has been owning and managing a group of 18 companies under the leadership of Chairman Nawab Shaji Ul Mulk. The company has achieved global recognition

with its flagship brand Alubond emerging as the world’s largest exterior facade panel, and its T10 Cricket league growing 2000% in the last 5 years to become the second-largest cricket league in the world with a viewership ofover 500 million.

ZIM CYBER CITY is the latest initiative of Mulk International and is destined to become another global landmark. The company follows a philosophy of strategic partnership, placing great value on building relationships with like-minded entities.

Mulk International has successfully entered into manypromising jointventureswithindustrygiants across the globe, making it the award-winning industrial powerhouse it is today. Its vision is to recognize pioneering locations with potential for growth and technological innovation and build smartcommunitiesofthefuturewherebusinesses and lifestyles flourish.

ZIM CYBER CITY is the first real estate investment in Zimbabwe channelled through the Zimbabwe Global Investments (ZGI) Special Economic Zone (SEZ) programme, approved by H.E. Emmerson Mnangagwa, President of Zimbabwe. This incentive programme will strengthen the business ecosystem by leveraging sustainable growth and mobilising investments in the country. All projects under ZGI will obtain the SEZ status. ZGIhastheresponsibilitytocreate aspecial windowfor clearing all foreign direct

Zim

Can the World Really Run on 100% Renewable Energy?

By Dan Gearino

IN 1975, Danish physicist Bent Sørensen published a paper examining the possibility that his country could run on 100 percent renewable energy. Appearing in the journal Science, it could have been an important moment for beginning to look seriously at transforming the way the world producesenergy.

Instead, crickets.

“It was not a loved idea at all,” said Christian Breyer, a faculty member at LUT University in Finland, in a video interview from his office.

Butthingshavechanged.Inthepastfiveyearsor so,as theworld facesthe escalating toll of climate change, the concept of 100 percent renewable energy gotten a much more serious look from scientists, policy analysts, andgovernments.

Breyeristheleadauthorofanewpaperpublished by IEEE Access tracing the development and growthofthisidea,andthepushback.Theconcept of 100 percent renewable energy hasn’t quite reached the mainstreamin most large economies, butit’s getting close,he said.

Ishould specify thatBreyer is not aneutral party in this discussion. He and the roughly two dozen coauthors of the paper include some of the bestknown researchers who focus on, and advocate for, 100 percent renewable energy. This includes Mark Jacobson of Stanford and Auke Hoekstra of Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands.

Thepaperisavaluableprimerforunderstanding what 100 percent renewable energy means, where these ideas have found the most support in government and what others say are the major flaws.

One of the people cited is Amory Lovins, an Americanphysicist whowroteabout thepossibility

of an all-renewable system in 1976. He would go ontobecofounderandchiefscientistoftheRocky Mountain Institute, now called RMI.

Lovins told me this week that the Breyer paper is “impressive and important” and he is pleased to see that Sørensen’s work is getting proper credit for being ahead of its time.

“It’s become increasingly obvious over the past fewdecadesthatall-renewableelectricitycanwork wellprettymuchanywhere,”Lovinssaid.“Denialis increasingly confined to the uninformed.”

One of the key factors is cost. Wind and solar powerarenowmuchlessexpensivethantheother leading sources of electricity, with solar now the leastexpensiveoption in much oftheworld.

Denmark has been a center of clean energy research and policy, and it has a national goal, adopted in 2011, to get to 100 percent renewable energy across the economy by 2050, including in challenging sectors like transportation and heavy industry.

The paper also notes that 48 countries pledged atCOP22in2016toreach100percentrenewable energy in the electricity sector.

The electricity sector is the easiest part of

the economy for which to make a transition to renewable sources, which is why that’s the part that’sgetting the mostattention fromgovernments right now,Breyer said.

The paper includes research on sector-specific transitions,likethepowersector,andoneconomywide transitions. Some are limited to specific countries, and some are global in scope.

In most countries, a shift to renewable energy is largely driven by a combination of wind and solar power. The growth of solar is a mix of utility-scale systems and smaller installations on rooftops. Other renewable sources, including hydropower and geothermal, among others, also may play a role.

Considering that some utilities used to say that even10percentrenewableenergywasn’tworkable, it’s not surprising that the idea of 100 percent renewable energy has faced steadycriticism.

The paper says “a consensus is starting to emerge that many of those early criticisms do not hold whenexamined in detail.”

But there remains plenty of skepticism, including from prominent and well-regarded energy researchers. One example is a 2018 paper

Africa’slargest windpowerproject (windfarmof 365turbinesonthe shoresofLakeTurkana) iinnorthern Kenya.

https://www.responsiblebusiness.com/news/ africas-news/africas-largest-wind-powerproject-opens-in-northern-kenya

coauthoredbyJesseJenkins,whichsaida shiftto100percentrenewableenergymay be possible, but the costs and technical challenges are high when moving from a mostly renewable system to an allrenewable system. The challenges have to do with building many interstate power linesandaccountingforthevariablenature of wind andsolar, among other issues.

One of the biggest points of conflict among researchers is whether nuclear power should be a significant part of the energymixgoingforward.Also,someanalystssay that natural gas power plants, when paired with carbon capture technology, could be a valuable resourceon the margins of a future grid.

At times, this is a debate between 100 percent renewableenergyand85 to90percentrenewable energy,bothofwhichwouldbemuch cleanerthan what wehave now.

I’mnotgoingtodelvetoodeeplyintothespecifics here,otherthantosaythattheBidenadministration is firmly in the camp that views nuclear and some fossilfuelsaspartofthemix.Thelargerpointisthat discussingthepossibilityof100percentrenewable energywon’tgetsomeonelaughedoutoftheroom the way it mighthave decades ago.

Breyer said momentum is on the side of the researchers and organizations that are looking at how 100 percent plans canbe implemented.

Going forward, I’ll look to Denmark and other countries on the leading edge of the transition to see what’s working and what isn’t, and how it influencestherest of the world.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90780356/ar-andvr-the-powerful-new-tools-that-are-connectingbrands-with-customers

Google Picks South Africa for its First Cloud

By Annie Njanja

TECH GIANT GOOGLE has today announced the launch of a cloud region in South Africa, its first in the continent, playing catch-up to other top providers like Amazon Web Services (AWS) and MicrosoftAzure, which made inroads into the continent a few yearsago.

Google said it is also building Dedicated Cloud Interconnect sites, which link users’ on-premises networks with Google’s grid, in Nairobi (Kenya), Lagos (Nigeria), and SouthAfrica (Capetown and Johannesburg), in its quest to provide full-scale cloud capabilities for its customers and partners inAfrica.

Google plans to tap its private subsea cable, Equiano, which connects Africa and Europe to power the sites. Equiano has been under developmentsince2019andhassofarmadefour landings — in Togo, Namibia, Nigeria and South Africa.

SouthAfricanowjoinsGoogle’sglobalnetworkof 35cloudregionsand106zonesworldwide,andthe announcement follows the recent preview launch ofregionsinMalaysia,ThailandandNewZealand. Google Cloud regions allow users to deploy cloud resources from specific geographic locations, and access several services including cloud storage, compute engine, and key management system.

“We are excited to announce the first Google Cloud region in Africa. The new region will allow for the localization of applications and services. It will make it really easier for our customers and partners to quickly deploy solutions for their businesses, whereby they’re able to leverage our computerartificialintelligenceormachinelearning capabilities, and data analytics to make smarter business decisions as they go forward,” said Google CloudAfrica director, NiralPatel.

He added that the new region and interconnect sites will take its cloud computing services closer to its clients, allowing its customers to choose where toconsume the products from.

“What we’re doing here is giving customers and partners a choice on where they’d like to store their data and where they’d like to consume cloud services, especially in the context of data sovereignty. This allows customers to then store the data in thecountryshouldthey choose to do so… I guess for me the most important element is that it gives customers the element of choice,” Patel said.

The ability for users to choose where they store their data is increasingly critical as countries like Kenya implement privacy and data laws, which requirecompaniestostoretheirdatawithinborders and process itthrough servers hosted locally.

The decision to set up a region in South Africa was informed by the demand for cloud services and the market’s potential. Still, the company is looking to launch in more markets within the continent as demand for its products soars. Its earlyadoptersincludelargeenterprisecompanies, ande-commercefirmslikeSouthAfrica’sTakeAlot and Kenya’sTwiga.

“We continue to evaluate market demands as weworkwithourcustomerstoseethemtransform andgrowinthesemarkets.Wecontinuouslymake theseassessments and it is on that basis, that we continue to invest,” Patel said.

AccordingtoresearchbyAlphaBetaEconomics, commissioned by Google Cloud, the SouthAfrica cloud region will contribute over $2.1 billion to South Africa’s GDP and support the creation of

Region in Africa

more than 40,000 jobs by 2030.

Google Cloud, Azure by Microsoft, and AWS are the three biggest public cloud storage players in the world, according to data from Gartner, but it’s unclear why until now, Google has been absent inAfrica.

Microsoft launched two cloud regions in South Africa: Cape Town and Johannesburg (only the cloud region in the latter remains active) in 2019, thesameyearGoogleannouncedit“hadnoplans toestablishacloudregionordatacenterinAfrica,” according to this report. However, it didn’t rule it from happening in the foreseeable future. Amazon followed suit in 2020, scaling its AWS data centers to South Africa through Cape Town. Oracle, another major player, also established its datacenterinJohannesburgthisyear.Inresponse towhetherGoogleisplayingcatchupwiththeother cloud storage players, both executives painted a picture whereby every major player is concerned about broadening the internet ecosystem inAfrica through their data centers rather than vying for a

more significant marketshare.

“In terms of where we are on the continent with the internet, the job to be done is thinking of how do we bring more people and businesses online, howdowehelpmoreentrepreneursgetaccessto capital and so on,” Gajria remarked. “In business parlance, this is less of a market share zero-sum game, but more of how do we work collectively acrosstheprivatesector,publicsector,civilsociety, to just build a large, vibrant internet ecosystem thathelpsbroadeneconomiesandbusinesses,as well asgenerate jobs.”

With Google’s launch, SouthAfrica now houses everycloud storage provider on thecontinent.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/googlepicks-south-africa-for-its-first-cloud-region-in-africa/ ar-AA12CviO

Image credit: techgoing.com, cloud.google.com, linkedin. com

Africa’s First Hydrogen Power Plant to Produce Electricity by 2024

ByAl Jazeera

FRENCH INDEPENDENT power producer HDF

Energy expects its green hydrogen power plant in Namibia,Africa’sfirst,to startproducingelectricity by2024,accordingtoaseniorcompanyexecutive.

“Yearly we can produce 142 gigawatt hours, enough for 142,000 inhabitants and that is conservative,” Nicolas Lecomte, HDF Energy director for SouthernAfrica, said on Monday.

Onceoperational,the3.1billionNamibiandollars ($181.25m)Swakopmundprojectwillsupplyclean electricity power, 24 hours a day all year round, boosting electricity supply in the SouthernAfrican nation.

Currently, Namibia imports more than a third of its power from neighbouring SouthAfrica.

One of the world’s sunniest and least densely populated countries, it wants to harness its vast potential for solar and wind energy to produce green hydrogen and position the country as a renewable energy hub inAfrica.

Hydrogeniscategorised“green”whenitismade with renewable power and is seen as key to help decarbonise industry, though the technology remainsimmature and relatively costly.

The project will see 85MW of solar panels powering electrolysers to produce hydrogen that

Presidentof Namibia Hage Gottfried Geingob speaks during the UNClimate Change Conference COP26 in Glasgow,Scotland, Tuesday, Nov. 2,2021. [File: Hannah McKay/AP]

© Provided byAl Jazeera

can be stored.

HDF Energy is also eyeing new projects across Africa and other parts of the world.

“Soon after Southern Africa, you will see HDF developing projects in East Africa,” Lecomte told Reutersnews agency.

The European Union also plans a deal with Namibia to support the country’s nascent green hydrogen sector and boost its own imports of the fuel, EU and Namibian officials said, as the bloc works to reduce its dependence on Russian energy sources.

Another company, Namibian-registered Hyphen Hydrogen Energy, is in talks with the country’s government to secure an implementation agreement for its planned$10bngreenhydrogenproject thatwillproducesome350,000tonnes of green hydrogen a year before 2030 for globaland regional markets.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ africa-s-first-hydrogen-power-plant-toproduce-electricity-by-2024/ar-AA11JtwC

Image credit: cleanstate.org.au

Bill Gates says Rich Countries are Tackling Hunger in Africa all Wrong

By Tim McDonnell

AFTER THE UKRAINE WAR scrambled trade networksforwheatandotherkeyfoodcommodities, the US and some other rich countries stepped up their food aid donations to countries in Africa and elsewhere hit hardest by skyrocketing prices. That should be a good news story. Butto Bill Gates, it’s the latest example of how backward the approach to tacklingglobal hunger has become.

The problem, Gates said in an interview with Quartz,isthat foodaidisacceleratinginresponse towar,economicturmoil,andclimatechange—but investment in agricultural research in low-income countries is far lower, and stagnating. Innovations in drought-tolerant seeds custom-made for the climate and crops of African countries, and other bespoketechnologiesthatarewellwithinthereach of scientists, offer a more effective, sustainable path away from hunger. The current approach, Gates implied, is a band-aid that fails to heal theunderlyingwound.

Overall, according to a new report from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the world is failing to meet all but two of the 17 “sustainable developmentgoals”thatwereadoptedbytheUNin 2015.Thosetwoarebothrelatedtochildmortality: If the current rate of progress continues, the world should hit the goal to bring preventable deaths of children under age 5 to 25 per 1,000 births by 2030, according to the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, which provides data for the Gates Foundation. It should alsoreachthegoaltoreduceneonatal mortalityto at least as low as12 per 1,000 livebirths by 2030.

But other goals—related to food and water security,education,thespreadofHIVandmalaria, and other urgent social, environmental, and health issues—remain out of reach. The pandemic and Ukraine war are partially to blame, Gates told

Quartz—butsoaretheunwillingnessorinabilityof governments to reconsider their spending habits. (This interview was edited for length and clarity.)

QZ: Why is ita problem that the world is spending so much on food aid?

Bill Gates: There’s no doubt food aid has saved lotsoflives.Butit’sverytricky.Sometimesyouget too little, sometimes you get too much and you causethepriceoffoodtodropbelowlocalfarmers’ cost of production and you can actually mess up the normal agricultural markets. In parallel with whateveracutereliefisrequired,youneedtheidea of inventing better seeds, educating the farmer on usingthoseseeds,gettingthecreditsystemtowork so thatfarmersgetthe fertilizer thatthey need. So the overall agricultural system is underinvested in.

There’s no better example of that than looking at the African continent. Given the cost of labor and the availability of land, Africa should be a net food exporter. But because of low productivity, it’s a net food importer. The urgency of the innovation pipeline comes both from the need to get African productivity up, but also the fact that the closer youaretothe equator,themoredamagingclimate changeisforagriculture.AndAfricaisthelastplace in the world where you have significant population growth.So it’sa huge challenge.

QZ: How would like to see the approach to tackling food security in Africa change?

Gates: Our goal for the public seed research system is to get up to $2 billion a year by 2030. AndIdon’tknowifwe’llgetthere.That’ssomething that should be very affordable.

WedoneedtogetAfricanscientistsengaged in the question of how quickly should we have

gene-edited seeds or other new types of crop innovation... You would think that the world’s innovation and approval engine and getting the African capacity to decide those tradeoffs would beaccelerating.Wearemakingsomeprogresson that. There are a number of innovative crops that are in various stages of regulatory approval, and that’satthetopoftheclimateadaptationlistbyfar.

Certainly without better seeds, we are going to fall short. As you get away from maize and rice and wheat, there hasn’t been much innovation in sorghum and millet and cassava... Agricultural innovation hasn’t had the African ecosystems and cropsas a highpriority.

QZ: How do we seem to be doing at this point on the SDGs? It seems like, in a lot of cases, we’re not on track for meeting the goal.

Gates: We’re way off track on the goals. There

aretwo general reasonsfor that. Oneisthatmany of the goals were set as extremely aspirational. Even in benign conditions, we would have been very unlikely to reach the goal.

But even the ones like childhood mortality or maternal mortality where we got a sort of “it’s possible to do”-type number in there, four things happened. Certainly the pandemic, that’s number one by a lot. The Ukraine-Russia war and what that’s doing to fertilizer prices and potentially to aid budgets... The third thing is the financial situation is such that deficit spending feels like you immediately pay for it with inflation. That meansAfricanindebtednessisstartingtobeareal problem. And then the fourth, I’d say that climate change—okay, we knew it was there, but the fact that it’s happening somewhat faster in terms of these heat waves, flooding, and other negative side effects. So putting that all together, that’s way

Afamily inEthiopia loads a bag of emergency relief grain onto a cart.

Agriculture

Hunger in Africa from page 53

moreheadwinds than I expected.

Now I always expect we’ll surprise a little bit on the innovation side, like better malaria drugs... What I see in the pipeline, whether it’s HIV, or our understanding of nutrition, or maternal mortality reductions—Icouldn’tbemoreexcitedaboutthat...

Food security requires long term investments. Women’s empowerment requires long term investments. These goals are the ones the world should pay attention to despite the distractions, particularly inEurope.

Whilerichcountriesacceleratetheircontributions tofoodaid,theygivelittletoagricultureresearchin low-income countries like Ethiopia.

QZ: Given these headwinds, is there a need for a fundamental re-evaluation of strategy on how we approach the goals?

Gates: Well, it was all working up until the pandemic. We are making hugeprogress.HIVdeathsaregoing down, vaccination rates are going up. The world cut childhood death in half. The pipeline for malaria tools will never be as good as it is today... It is true that markets don’t don’t incentivize innovation on behalf of thepoorest.Andthat’spartlywhywe needenlightenedmoralgovernments to provide the aid. And we need philanthropists to take some of their resources and spend them not just in their own country. So I don’t think some radically different approach is called for here, despite the difficulty. I mean, you know, if we could have avoided the pandemic or the Ukraine war, God knows the economic cycle would turn at some point. It won’t last forever.

QZ: COP27, the next annual global climate summit, is coming up soon in Egypt, and will focus on international climate finance, which is far below where it needs to be. How can we

change that?

Gates: Well,foreignaidandclimatefinancearen’t really two different things. Are you really telling peoplewho usedtobuydiarrhealvaccinesto zero that out and send it over into a climate bucket and say hallelujah? I mean, diarrhea is worse because of climate change, so it’sall climate-related.

There’s not much upside. In the US Congress, there’s a strong strand of “America First.” And, come on, electricity price subsidization in Europe, that’s like 2% of GDP. And rebuilding Ukraine and Ukrainian refugee costs. I mean, let’s be serious. I don’t care how many meetings you have, how much are you going to squeeze out of the rich country grantbudgets?

I was a little worried when [the COP] went to yearly meetings, because the activists, although they’re righteous, their sense of how much can be done in a year… I mean, jeez, it feels like [COP26 in] Scotland was yesterday and now here we are.

When it was every five years, we could almost get our act together. I’m worried that getting mad because the $100 billion isn’t there, or to change thedefinition sowe canpretendit isthere—Idon’t know that that’s where the biggest impact is. So I hope the meeting ends up being a constructive thing, and not just a shrill “where’s-the-money?” thing.

countries-040500279.html

https://qz.com/bill-gates-says-rich-

Reimagining How and Where Fresh Food is (Can Be) Grown.

From Fast Company

GOTHAM GREENS, the Brooklyn-based urbanfarmingstartup,aimstoprovethat growingcrops in greenhouses on city rooftops can be more efficient and sustainable thantraditional methods.

GothamGreensStory

We are a fresh food company farming with the future in mind. We build and operate sustainable greenhouses in cities across America, where we grow our year-round supply of local produce. Local cultivation and regional distribution help us deliver our products quickly after being harvested toensuretheyarefreshtasting,nutritionallydense and long-lasting. Our farms are unconventional. But so is our commitment to taste, quality and sustainability.

AYear-RoundHarvest

Green produce starts with green decisions. Our indoor farming facilities are sun (and wind) powered, and climate controlled for a year-round growingseason.Thismeanswecanprovideclean, sustainable and quality food to our communities. Any time, anywhere.

Sustainability

Sustainability isn’t just about being smarter. It meanschangingthewaywethink.Workingindoors means we can grow more produce (per square foot per year) than is possible with conventional farming. Plus, a unique hydroponic greenhouse technology means using lessland, less water and less energy, while producing less pollution and less waste.

Technology

Our latest greenhouses are advanced, datadriven, climate-controlled facilities — the most efficient production systems available today. These greenhouses are some of the highestyielding farms around and use less energy, less

landandlesswaterthanotherfarmingtechniques. Plus,advancementsinmachinelearninganddata analysis allow us to monitor our crop’s health and progress, so we can deliver a fresher, more delicious product. Happy greens make happy people.

Community

We’re committed to creating jobs for local residents from our communities. In addition to healthy and enjoyable year-round work, we’re also dedicated to urban renewal and becoming permanentfixturesinourhomecities.Bypartnering with local schools, community leaders and nonprofits,GothamGreenshelpstoputbetterfoodon the table through environmental, educational and community initiatives.

These programs are rooted in the communities surrounding Gotham Greens' facilities, but the impact extends beyond the borders of its neighborhoods.

Locality

While there are many ways to farm responsibly andsustainably,ourapproachisdesignedtobring the farm closer to you.

Building greenhouses next to large urban populations and distributing regionally allows us to reduce transportation time, fuel consumption and associated emissions. Our greens get where they’re going faster, stay fresh longer (like, a lot longer), retain more of their nutrients and reduce food waste.

Quality

Our produce isn’t the best because of how we grow, it’s the best because of who grows it. Our greenhouses are built upon the collective values, talents and energy of our diverse team. While our technology has redefined urban agriculture, our dedicatedfarmersaretherealsecretto producing and delivering delicious fresh food, from seed to store.

Foods Market,

Moderna Gives WHO’s mRNA Hub Some Help, Pfizer Snubs Request

By Antony Sguazzin

MODERNA INC. HAS allowed its Covid-19 vaccine tobe usedin aWorld HealthOrganization effort to develop mRNA shots that would increase production and access for poor countries.

Afrigen Biologics & Vaccines, a South African biotechnology company working with the WHO, has used the Moderna vaccine in comparison studies in mice to test the effectiveness of its own shots, said Petro Terblanche, Afrigen’s managing director.

Demand for Covid shots has slowed across the world as more recent variants of the virus have caused milder illness,yetmanypeoplein low-and middle-income countries like South Africa remain unvaccinated and vulnerable to the potentially lethal disease. With Moderna’s help, Afrigen is aimingtodevelopashotthatmaybemanufactured byatleast15productionfacilitiesaroundtheglobe under the aegis of the WHO’s mRNA Vaccine Technology Transfer Hub in CapeTown.

Moderna didn’t supply the vaccine directly. It allowed the vaccine to be provided by the French government after a request from the United Nations-backed Medicines Patent Pool, according to Marie-Paule Kieny, the pool’s chair. Pfizer Inc. refused a similar request because it didn’t regard the need as urgent, she said.

Moderna and the partnership of Pfizer and BioNTech SE have come under increased pressure to allow factories in poorer countries to produce their vaccines after the world’s richest nations raced to inoculate their populations while barely any vaccines were available in large parts of Africa. Pfizer’s shot is the most commonly used Covid-19 vaccine in South Africa while Moderna’s inoculationhasbarelybeenusedonthecontinent.

More Support Needed

“Since the start of the pandemic Pfizer has received many requests to collaborate on

studies and other initiatives from many different worthy sources,” Pfizer said in a response to questions.“Unfortunately,itisimpossibletosupport themallandourfocusremainsondeliveringasper ourexistingsupplyagreementswithgovernments.”

Moderna declined to comment.

France has supported the mRNA hub, giving it 20 million euros ($20 million) in assistance so far, said Kieny. The WHO’s mRNA hub has a more ambitious plan, with the production of a vaccine designed by Afrigen to take place at factories in countries including South Africa, Argentina, Ukraineand Bangladesh.

The early-stage trials of Afrigen’s shot in mice produced “a strong immune response,” the company said. Moderna placed some conditions ontheuseofitsvaccineinthestudies,Terblanche said,decliningto elaborate.

Still, Afrigen may need further assistance from Moderna or Pfizer, including allowing the use of vaccine for comparative human trials that are expectedtostartbyMay.Thatrequestisexpected in coming weeks, Kieny said.

UltimatelytheWHOplanstofollowtheproduction of a Covid-19 vaccine with an attempt to develop inoculations for neglected diseases that plague thecitizensofpoorcountriessuchastuberculosis, HIV-AIDS,someformsofcancerandhemorrhagic feverssuchasEbola,LassafeverandtheMarburg virus. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-19/ moderna-gives-who-s-mrna-hub-some-help-pfizersnubs-request

By Giulia Paravicini

Top to Bottom:Hon. Olusegun

Obasanjo, Hon. Uhuru Kenyatta, Hon. Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka

ETHIOPIA'S GOVERNMENT

has accepted an invitation by the African Union to participate in peace talks aimedatendinga two-year conflict with rival Tigray forces, the prime minister's national security adviser said on Wednesday.

Tigray forces have has yet to respond to the invitation for talks this weekend in South Africa, which would be the first formal negotiations between the two sides since the outbreakofwarin November 2020, two diplomatic sources said.

The conflict has killed thousands of civilians and uprootedmillions. Both sides had previously said they were prepared to participate in AU-mediated talks but intense fighting has continued to rage acrossTigray.

The Ethiopian government "has accepted this invitationwhichisinlinewithourprincipledposition

regarding the peaceful resolution of the conflict and theneedto have talkswithout preconditions," Redwan Hussein, the national security adviser to Prime MinisterAbiyAhmed, said on Twitter.

AU Commission Chair Moussa Faki also invited Debretsion Gebremichael, who leads Tigray's rulingpolitical party,to the talks in a letter seen by Reuters.

TheletterwasdatedOct.1,butGetachewReda, a spokesman for Debretsion's Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), said on Tuesday that he was notaware of any imminenttalks.

Getachew did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday about the EthiopiangovernmentacceptingtheAUinvitation.

The TPLF said last month it was ready for a ceasefire and would accept an AU-led peace process after previously raising objections to AU proposals.

Olusegun Obasanjo, the AU High Representative for the Horn of Africa, will lead the negotiations with support from former Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta and former South African deputy president Phumzile MlamboNgcuka, according to theAU letter.

Noformaltalksbetweenthetwosideswereheld during a five-month ceasefire between March and August. Fighting resumedonAug.24.

Prime Minister Abiy's government accuses the TPLF, which dominated Ethiopia's ruling coalition until Abiy came to power in 2018, of trying to reassertTigrayandominance over Ethiopia.

The TPLF accuses Abiy of over-centralising power and oppressing Tigrayans. Both dismiss each other'saccusations.

Uganda Pays First War Reparations Payment to DR Congo

By Daniel Stewart

TheInternational Court of Justice, whichhas its seatin The Hague, is the principal judicial organof the United Nations

THE UGANDAN GOVERNMENT has made a first payment of $65 million (€64.2 million) in war reparations to the Democratic Republic of Congo, part of the total $325 million (€321.1 million) pledged.

ThefigurehasbeenimposedbytheInternational Court of Justice (ICJ), the UN's highest judicial body for settling disputes between states. The court condemned Uganda for crimes perpetrated on Congolese soil during the Second Congo War (1998-2003).

The first payment was made on September 1, accordingtotheminutesoftheCongoleseCouncil of Ministers meeting on September 9, reports Bloomberg newsagency.

These funds were reportedly transferred to a transitional account linked to the Congolese Ministry of Justice. DRC will create a fund "for the compensation of victims of Uganda's illegalactivities" on Congolese soil,accordingto the minutes.

A spokesman for the Ugandan Ministry of Finance,JimMugunga,explainedthathecouldnot

comment at this time on the status of the payment or confirm its payment.

TheICJdecision stemsfromthe 1999 complaint filed against UGanda for the occupation of the eastern part of the country. The war reparations include:

»$225million for personal injury, »$40 million for property damage and »$60million for damage to natural resources, according to the ruling lastFebruary.

Some 5.4 million people died as a result of the Second Congo War, most of them from starvation anddisease.Itwasthelargestconflictinthehistory oftheAfricancontinent,involvinguptoninestates as well as numerous irregular forces, and lasted from 1998 to 2003, when the Pretoria Accords weresigned.However,severalarmedrebelgroups arestillactiveineasternDRC,inconfrontationwith the Congolese Armed Forces.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ugandapays-first-war-reparations-payment-to-dr-congo/ ar-AA11JLpO

Another Caribbean Country Considers Removing Queen Elizabeth as Head of State

By Parker Diakite

ANOTHER CARIBBEAN COUNTRY is considering removing Queen Elizabeth II as the head ofstate.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister, Dr. Ralph Gonsalves, proposed a single-item referendum asking citizens whether the queen should remain the head of state in parliament or appoint a nonexecutive, homegrown president.

Gonsalves says he will only push for the referendumifthere is bipartisan support.

“I am prepared, if the opposition agrees today, beforetheendofthe yearorearlynextyear,toput one question in a referendum,” says Gonsalves. “[Andthat’s]tohaveahomegrownpresidentinthe manner in which I’ve just described.”

If there’s bipartisan support, citizens will take up the issue by a vote. In 2009, Vincentians overwhelminglyvotedagainsttheproposedrevised constitution. More than 29,000 people voted “no,” and 22,493 voted “yes.”

“I agree that we are now 12 years away from the referendum,” Gonsalves adds.

MovingTowardsDecolonization

Gonsalves is hoping to take a page from Barbados’ playbook.

On November 30, 2021, Barbados removed the Queen of England as its head ofstate and elected DameSandraMasonasitsfirstlocalheadofstate.

Barbadoshasbeenanindependentcountrysince 1966. But the country, along with 16 others that

wereformallypartoftheso-called“Britishempire,” stillrecognizedQueenElizabethIIasitssovereign head of state until Barbados’ recent decision, as we previouslyreported.

“It’s not a divisive decision. It’s not a decision that isreflectiveofanybreakwiththemonarchyor anydisrespect.Infact,it’squitetheopposite,”says Mason. “We have an excellent relationship with the United Kingdom, with the royal family and we believe that the time has just come for us to boost the confidence of our people.”

It’s a decision that Gonsalves wants for Vincentians. He says if there is bipartisan support for the referendum, then a committee will also be setup to establishnational honors.

Hesaysthecommitteewillcarryoutaprocessof decolonizing names.

“WechangethenameofVictoriaPark.Wechange the name of Higginson Street and other places. Murrays Road, cause is a colonial administrator. And we do that, especially at this time of fresh hope,” says Gonsalves.

Gonsalves has suggested the country should moveforwardwithnationalheroessuchasGeorge Agusutus McIntosh, Ebenezer Theodore Joshua, Robert Milton Cato, and JP Eustace, according to Caribbean National Weekly.

https://travelnoire.com/another-caribbean-countryconsiders-removing-queen-elizabeth-as-head-of-state

Image credit: nbcsvg.com, countryaah.com

Biden Announces US-Africa Summit for Mid-December

By Al Jazeera and News Agencies

PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN has announced that the United States will bring together leaders from across the African continent for a major summit in Washington,DCthisDecembertodiscusspressing challenges fromfood securitytoclimate change.

“The summit will demonstrate the United States’ enduring commitment to Africa, and will underscore the importance of U.S.-

Africa relations and increased cooperation on shared global priorities,” Biden said in a statement on Wednesday.

The US-Africa Leaders Summit, scheduled for December 13-15, was announced simultaneously invirtualremarksbyVicePresidentKamalaHarris to the US-Africa Business Summit in Marrakesh, Morocco. The latter event is being hosted by

'▲The summitwill demonstratethe United States’enduring commitmenttoAfrica, and will underscore the importanceof U.S.-Africa relationsand increased cooperation on shared global priorities,' President Biden said in a statement[File: Kevin Lamarque/Reuters].

►Vice President Kamala Harris EcoNewsAfrique

the Corporate Council on Africa and the Kingdom of Morocco. A senior administration official, while discussing the US-Africa summit plans on condition of anonymity, told the Reuters news agency that about 50 African leaders are expected to join Biden for the December 13-15 series of meetings.

It will come at the end of a year when Biden has engaged other regions of the world with trips

to visit US allies in Asia, Europe and the Middle East. Biden has yet to visit Africa sincebecomingpresident,andthesummit willbehismostcomprehensivelookatthe complexities of the continent.

So far, Biden’s diplomatic efforts have focused on promoting Western democraciesasacounterweighttoChina, but the official said the US-Africa summit wasnotall about Beijing.

“We are not asking our African partners to choose,” the official told Reuters. “We believe theUnitedStatesoffersabettermodel,butweare not asking our African partnersto choose.”

TheUSAgencyforInternationalDevelopment announced on Monday that it is providing nearly $1.3bn in aid to the Horn of Africa nations of Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia to help stave off massstarvationanddeathsinthedrought-stricken region.

Biden said the summit will work towards new economic engagement, promote democracy and human rights, advance peace and security, and address challenges such as food security and climate change as wellasthe pandemic.

ThepresidentbelievesthatUScollaborationwith leadersfromAfricangovernments,civilsociety,the private sector and the African diaspora will help tackle some of the challenges, theofficial said.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/7/20/bidenannounces-u-s-africa-summit-for-mid-december

Imagecredit: thedailyjournalist.com

Black Harvard Grad Kwasi Kwarteng Appointed Britain's First Black Finance Manager

By Derek Major

BRITISHPRIMEMINISTERLizTrusshas appointed Harvard University graduate Kwasi Kwarteng Britain’s new and first Black Finance Minister.

The Ghana Business News (GBN) reports that Kwarteng,47,isthefirstBlackmantobeappointed as the Chancellor of the Exchequer and will be responsible for handling a Britain economy that is still reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic, the highest inflation rate in four decades, and an energy crisis due to the Ukraine-Russia war.

Kwarteng is the child of Ghanaian immigrants who attended Cambridge University and Harvard. TheBritisheconomyisexpectedtohitarecession later this year, and Kwarteng supports Truss’ new low tax,free-market approach tothe economy.

“Kwasi Kwarteng clearly has been a big part of Team Truss… So she’s putting in someone who she thinksshareshersortofgoverning philosophy and priorities,” said Jill Rutter, the Senior Fellow at theInstituteforGovernmentandaformerTreasury official. “The energy and business background should stand him, in terms of understanding the realeconomy,inquiteagoodstead…whathe’snot

doneisabigpublicservice

job or abig spending job.”

TheIvyLeaguegraduate is also an economic historian who has written a book on Margret Thatcher and her economic legacy and a second book, co-authored by Truss. Kwarteng previously led the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and is a Brexit supporter.

Critics of Kwarteng have questioned his achievements at BEIS and his credentials for the finance ministry.

“Some say he’s not tough enough to do the Chancellor job at a time when Britain needs someone who can push things through,” one lawmaker told GBN, while a veteran Conservative said the Treasurywould “approveofhis brain (but) disapprove of his independence.”

Kwarteng also said that despite experiencing racism and discrimination during his life, he does not see himself as a symbol of Black success in the U.K. but assomeone serving hisconstituents.

“I actually think that it’s not that much of a big deal,” Kwarteng said, according to GBN. “I. think once you’ve made the point, I don’t think it’s something that comes up that much.”.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

Zimbabwean University Unveils its CBDC Design

By Owotunse Adebayo

ZIMBABWEAN TERTIARY

institution, the Harare Institute of Technology, has announced that its CentralBankDigitalCurrency is currently in the works. The news was made available to the public today by the Vice Chancellor of the university, Quinton Kanhukamwe. In the statementbytheViceChancellor, the CBDC is projected to help the country battle vices related to the market. Some of these vicesincludethe manipulationof the country’s currency, hoarding cash, and a long list of other illegal activities.

TheZimbabweaninstitution wantstotackleillegal activities

The Vice-Chancellor broke the news to the public at the graduation ceremony held by the university. In attendance wasthe president ofthe country, Emmerson Mnangagwa. At the

ceremony, the Zimbabwean institute head mentioned that the CBDC could be the key that would eventually help them incorporate the unbanked into the system.

CBDCs have been touted as thenextgenerationofcurrencies worldwide. The vice chancellor mentioned that most people not using the formal banking sector feelitistheretotakefromalltheir hard-earned sweat. However, he mentioned that the CBDC in the works by the Zimbabwean institution would ensure that all costs are significantly reduced while enabling minor payments for transactions.

RBZplanstoconsultthe publiconitsCBDC

The Zimbabwean institution’s VC also clarified that once the development and the eventual rollout of the CBDC are in place, it will enable businesses to bring

in more people. He also highlighted that using CBDCs will ensure that all printing costs are significantly reduced. A previous statement by the central bank of the country pointed out that a roadmap is presently in place to ensure that the rolloutoftheCBDCis seamless. However, the bank has mentioned that it is working on a public paper seeking the public’s opinion on the CBDC.

It also highlights that the paper will state clearly the risks and benefits of holding and using the potential CBDC. Also, the bank has refused to note a start date for the roadmap or when the CBDC would be eventually available to the general public. The bank also did not clarify if it was employing other entities to assist in creating the digital currency. However, the report hints towards the possibility that the tertiary institution may have been charged with helping the country design and roll out the CBDC.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/ money/news/zimbabweanuniversity-unveils-its-cbdcdesign/ar-AA12Tsbr

Zimbabwean university unveilsitsCBDC design © Provided by Cryptopolitan

Senegal’s Macky Sall Delivered a List of Striking African Demands at This Year’s UNGA

By Alexander Onukwue

PresidentSall, theAfricanUnionchair,raisedthesubjectofAfricanpermanence ontheUN securitycouncil

MACKY SALL, the president of Senegal and chairoftheAfricanUnion,sentadirectmessageto hisfellowworldleaders:Africadoesnotwanttobe the battleground for a proxy war between nations on opposing sides of the Russia-Ukraine war.

It was one of the highlights of his address yesterday (Sept. 20) at this year’s United Nations GeneralAssembly meeting inNew York.

“I have come to say that Africa has suffered enoughoftheburdenofhistory,”saidSallwhohas become the loudest African voice advocating for an equal seat for the continent at crucial decisionmakingtables.Ratherthanbethestageforanother ColdWar,Africawantstobea“poleofstabilityand opportunity open to all its partners, on a mutually beneficial basis,” he said.

Africa demands to exit the sidelines

Sall’s remarks come within the last fortnight of reflection on Africa’s place in the world following the passing of the last British monarch to have colonialsubjects onthecontinent.

In the decades since the drastic dilution of the British Empire, the postcolonial world shepherded by the United Nations has prioritized so-called worldpowersatitshighestdecisionmakinglevels. TheUN’ssecuritycouncilistheprimeexample:its five permanent member countries, none African, hold powers of veto that affect how UN bodies intervene on the continent’s critical peace and security matters.

SallremindedhiscolleaguesthatAfricawantsto change this, citing the Ezulwini Consensus where Africanleadersdemandedtwopermanentseatson thesecuritycouncil.Grantingthatwish,in addition to a G20 seat, will show the world is prepared to “overcome the reluctance and deconstruct the narratives that persist in confining Africa to the margins ofdecision-making circles.”

Credit rating agencies must treat Africa better

The African Union is marching towards setting upacredit ratingagencyforthecontinent,andthe effort has the backing of member countries. But meanwhile, the body wants fairer treatment from the big three agencies when they evaluate African governments’ international fundraising efforts (typicallythrough eurobonds).

Dominant in the US thanks to their legally protected status, Standard & Poor’s (S&P), Moody’s, and Fitch have extended their reach to assess African governments and businesses,oftenresultingindissatisfaction.

GCR, the continent’s major ratings agency, was bought by Moody’s earlier this year, cementing the big three’s market share.

Sall expressed concern that “the perception of risk in Africa continues to be higher than the actual risk,” causing high insurance premiums and making African economiesappearunattractivetoinvestors.

He cited an IMF and World Bank-assisted report that urged Moody’s and the other agencies to be more transparent with their

methodologies“soasnottoundermineconfidence in ratings.”

Senegal wantstoexplore its oilandgas reserves

In addition to calling for an end to sanctions against Zimbabwe, Sall’s other major submission at UNGA is one he has championed arguably for whatitcoulddoforhisnativeSenegal:thatAfrican countries should exploit existing oil and gas reserves,evenasthecontinentremainscommitted to the idealsof the ParisClimateAgreement

Angola and Nigeria are among Africa’s oil dependent economies, even if decades of exploitationhavefailedtocorrelatewithworld-class qualityoflifeorhighincome.Atrailofenvironmental damage has followed too, as new reports from Nigeria’s riverine areas show. Still, “the continent that pollutes the least and lags furthest behind in the industrialisation process should exploit its available resources,” Sall said, pointing to the 600 million Africans withoutelectricity.

OffshoreoilproductioninSenegal issettobegin in 2023 at the rate of up to 120,000 barrels a day from a reserve of 2.5 billion barrels.

Whether the country’s state-run company will avoid the pitfalls that have dogged its more experienced West African neighbor remains to be seen. But Sall’s demand is that Africa, faced withdevelopmentchallengesthatforthemostpart barely affect wealthier western countries, would like to not be barred from putting its resources to use.

“We want a multilateralism that is open and respectfulofourdifferences,”hesaid,“because the United Nations system, born out of the ashes of war, can only win the support of all on thebasisofsharedideals, not local values erected as universalnorms.”.

https://news.yahoo.com/ senegal-macky-salldelivered-list-123600681.

United Nations says 50 Million People Worldwide Stuck in ‘Modern Slavery’

By Al Jazeera

The pandemic, armed conflicts, and climate change have exacerbated conditions, trapping people in forced labour or marriage.

THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE trapped in forced labour or forced marriage and other crises has swelledbyafifthinrecentyearstoabout50million on any given day,the United Nations’ International Labour Organization (ILO) said on Monday.

The study by the UN agencies for labour and migration along with the Walk Free Foundation found that at the end of last year, more than half of those had been forced to work against their will and the rest forced into marriage,theILO said.

That means nearly one out of every 150 people in the world are caught up in modern forms of slavery, the reportsaid.

Both came under its definition of modern slavery astheyinvolved peoplewho“cannot refuse or cannot leave because of threats, violence, deception, abuse of power or other forms of coercion”, it added.

TheUNhadsetagoaltoeradicate all forms of modern slavery by 2030,butthenumberofpeoplecaught upinforcedlabourorforcedmarriage balloonedby10millionbetween2016 and 2021,according to a new report.

Thesituationhadbeenexacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which worsened conditions and swelled debt levels for many workers, as well as armed conflicts and climate change, leaving people in extreme poverty and forcing more to migrate, the agencysaid.

“Ithink,byandlarge, thatwesimply relaxed our efforts. We’ve taken our

eyeofftheballwhenitcomestoforcedlabour,”ILO DirectorGeneralGuyRydertoldtheReutersnews agency, calling for improvements in recruitment practices and labour inspections.

He said trade measures, such as a ban on products and imports made with forced labour currently under review by the European Union, could also help.

Modern slavery is present in basically every country, with more than half of cases of forced labour and a quarter of forced marriages in uppermiddle-income or high-incomecountries..

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/12/ modern-slavery-swells-to-50-million-on-anygiven-day-un

The number of peopletrapped in forced labour or forced marriage has swelled to about 50 million on any given day, the International Labour Organization says [File: Seyllou/AFP]

WHENAMANDAGORMANwasinvitedtoread anewlydevelopedpoemattheU.N.General Assembly,theyoungsensationtookadeeplook athowseveralsocietalissues—suchashunger andpoverty—haveimpactedEarth’spreservation.

Justlikeherstirringinaugurationpoemlastyear, Gormanfeltcompelledtoexpresstheimpactof unitythroughherpoeticwordsontheopening dayofthe77thsessionMondayinNewYork. The24-year-oldpoetcreated“AnOdeWeOwe” inhopesofbringingallnationstogethertotackle variousissuesofdisparityalongwithpreservingthe planet.

Gormanonceagaingracedcenterstageinfrontof worldleaders.Herfameexplodedaftersherecited herpoem“TheHillWeClimb”atPresidentJoe Biden’sinauguration,whichmadehertheyoungest inauguralpoetinU.S.history.Herpoemquickly toppedbestsellerslistsandmadeheroneofthe mostin-demandpoets,puttingheronotherbig stagesliketheSuperBowlandinaninterviewwith OprahWinfrey.

InanexclusiveinterviewwithTheAssociated PressonSunday,Gormantalkedaboutherhopes fortheU.N.poem,herfuturepresidencyplans, resentmentshe’sgottentowardhercommercial successandwantingtosomedaywriteanovel.

Remarkshavebeeneditedforclarityandbrevity.

AP:Whatdoyouwantlistenerstotake awayfromyourpoem?

GORMAN:WhatIhopepeoplecangarnerfrom thepoemisthatwhileissuesofhungerandpoverty andilliteracycanfeelGoliathandaresohuge,it’s notnecessarilythattheseissuesaretoolargeto beconquered.Butthey’retoolargetobestepped awayfrom.

AP:Howimportantishavingayoung voicelikeyourselftospeakatthe GeneralAssembly?

GORMAN:WhenIwaswritingthispoem,Ikept gettingflashbacksofseveralyearsagowhenI cametoNewYorkforthefirsttime.Iwas16and IwascomingastheUnitedNationsdelegatefor theCommissionontheStatusofWomen.That wasthefirsttimeI’dreallyeverengagedtheU.N. asaspaceinanyway.Ijustremembernotseeing peoplewholookedasyoungasme.Ialsolooked

Amanda Gorman UN Poem: By Newslooks

Amanda Gorman recites a poem during an event headquarters, Monday, Sept. 19, 2022. The importance of the United Nations’ (AP Photo/Seth

likeIwas11atthetime.Istartedmarinatingonthis ideaof“Iwanttocomebacksomedayinthefuture. Idon’tjustwanttobeadelegate.Iwanttobea presenter.”I’mnotheretospeakonbehalfofyoung people,buttospeakalongsideandwiththem.

AP:WhydidyoutouchonSustainable DevelopmentGoalsinyourpoem?

GORMAN:Iactuallythinkthatthere’sswaths ofthepopulationwhichhasyettobeengagedor kindoftoldoractivatedaroundtheSustainable DevelopmentGoals.SomuchofwhatIliketodo inthepoemismakingsurethatweraiseawareness aroundtheseissuesandshowthatthesegoalsdo exist.

AP:Howhaveyoumanagedthe transitiontobeingahigh-level celebrity?

Poem: ‘An Ode We Owe’

Newslooks Team

event called “SDG Moment” at United Nations event is meant to highlight the urgency and Nations’ sustainable development goals.

Photo/Seth Wenig)

GORMAN:I’mstilllearningandgrowingsomuch. Ithinkoneofthethingsthatchangedsomuchforme wasjustprivacy.AllofasuddenIbecamesomeone —whichIneverreallynecessarilyexpected—who getsrecognizedonthestreet.IfIgotoarestaurant, evenifI’mwearingamask,peopleareverygoodat spottingmyfaceandormyvoice.I’mverygrateful forthattypeofvisibility,eventhoughsometimesI domissindividualprivacybecauseitmeansthatI haveaplatformthatIcanuseforgood.

AP:Howhavepeopleapproachedyou whileinpublic?

GORMAN:Ihadanexperience(Saturday)night. Iwaseatingatarestaurantandawomanjustcame uptomeandstartedcryingandsayinghowmuch mypoetrymeanttoher.It’sflabbergastingtome. That’snotarareoccurrenceinmylifeanymore.

Myfriendsstartedcryingaroundmeseeingthis woman’semotion.Ihadagreatconversationwith thatwomanbeforeshemovedon,andmehaving totakeamoment,sitwiththefactthattherewereso manypeoplearoundtheworldwhoprobablyhave thisperson’ssameresponsethathaven’tgottento me.IwanttodojusticebythemwhenIwrite.Iwant tohonorthemwhenIwrite.That’sareallyhefty task.ButIalsothinkit’sadeepseatedprivilegeof mine.Ithinkthat’sthethingthatIwrestlewithand drawpowerfromwhenIwrite.

AP:Hasthefamechangedyourwriting?

GORMAN:Ithinkithasn’tchangedmywriting inthesensethatmyvoiceandstyleisstillthe samebecausetherootsofwhereIcomefromare stillthere.ButIdothinkitmakesmethinkmore creativelyandimaginativelyaboutwaysinwhichI cangetthosepoemsintheworld.

AP:Isitmuchhardertowritethese days?

GORMAN:Ithinkthemaindifficultyinwriting poetryformenowadaysis,yes,thatthere’salot goingon.ButevenifI’mabletocarveouttimeand spacetowrite,IthinkthebiggestchallengethatI canfacesometimesisjustmyownself-sabotagein thesensethatIfeelsomuchpressureandsomany eyesonme.

AP:Howdoyoukeepoutthe distractions?

GORMAN:I’mlikea70-year-oldinan11-year-old body.Ihavemusclesfromthatofpullingawayfrom technologyandpretendinglikeit’snotthere.Like itdoesn’texist.WhenIwrite,Itendtoputallmy deviceson“DoNotDisturb.”

AP:Haveyouhadtodealwithany resentmentfromthepoetrycommunity, whosometimesdon’tlookkindlyupon commercialsuccess?

GORMAN:TheonlytypeoftrollingthatI experienceisactuallynotfromotherpoets.It’sfrom peoplewhodon’twritepoetry.Ihearthosekindof like“WhatAmandaGormandoesisn’tthatdifficult. Idon’tunderstandwhyshe’sfamous.”Ihaveno illwilltowardsthosepeople.Iactually,inasense,

How can Iask you to dogood, When we’ve barelywithstood Our greatestthreatsyet:

Thedepths of death, despair and disparity, Atrocitiesacrosscities, towns& countries, Lives lost, climactic costs.

Amanda Gorman

Exhausted, angered, weare endangered, Notbecause ofour numbers, Butbecause of our numbness.We’re strangers To one another’s perils and pain, Unawarethat the welfare of the public And the planet share a name–

–Equality

Doesn’tmean being the exactsame, Butenacting a vast aim:

Thegoodofthe worldto its highest capability. Thewise believe that our people without power Leaves our planet without possibility. Therefore,though povertyis a poor existence, Complicity is a poorer excuse. We must go the distance, Though this battle ishard and huge, Though this fightwedidnotchoose, For preserving the earth isn’t a battletoo large To win, but a blessing too large to lose. This is the most pressing truth: That Our people have only one planet to call home

AnOdeWe Owe from page 71

feelbadforthembecausemoreoftenthannot, thesearepeoplewhohaven’tbeenexposedtoa lotofpoetryintheirlives,whohaven’tbeeneither encouragedorchallengedtowritepoetryintheir lifetimes.

AP:Whatareyourthoughtstoward thoseskeptics?

GORMAN:IthinktheonethingIhavetosayto thosepeoplewouldbeifyou’rereadingmywork andyou’resaying,“AmandaGorman’swritingisso easyformetodoandIcandobetter.”Oh,myGod.

Weneedyou.Weneedyoutopickupapenand write.Thatmeansyou’regoingtobethenextgreat

someday?

GORMAN:Yes,that’sstillthecase.Iobviously havealongwaytogo—notjustintermsofyears, butintermsoflearning.

AP:Isthereatimetable?

GORMAN:No,I’mjustlivingandenrichingmy lifewiththeunderstandingof“Wow,girlyouarea weaponofculturalandpoeticpower.Here’swhere

Poem: ‘An Ode We Owe’ Newslooks Team

Andourplanethasonlyonepeopletocallitsown. Wecaneitherdivideandbeconqueredbythefew, Or we can decide to conquer thefuture, And say thattoday a new dawn we wrote, Say that as long aswe have humanity, We will foreverhave hope.

Together, we won’t just be the generation That tries but the generation thattriumphs; Let us see a legacy

Where tomorrow isnotdriven Bythe human condition, Butbyour human conviction. And while hope alonecan’tsave us now, With itwe can bravethe now, Because our hardestchange hinges On our darkestchallenges. Thus may our crisis be our cry, ourcrossroad, Theoldestodeweoweeachother.

We chime it, for the climate, For our communities. We shall respectand protect

youdecidewhattodowithit.”Whetherthatfollows aspecifictablethat’sexplicitforthepresidencyor whetherit’sonethat’sabitmoreunorthodoxand nontraditionalthanwe’veseen,Ithinkremainsto beseen.

AP:Doyouaspiretowritesomething besidespoetry?

GORMAN:Ilovepoetry,butIloveallformsof writing.WhenIwasyounger,Iactuallywantedto beanovelwriter.Butnovelsjusttake—forme—a longeramountoftimethanasinglepoem.That’s justhowmybrainandwritingworks.ButIwould lovetogetoutsomemoreprose,somemoreessay

Every part of this planet, Hand itto every hearton this earth, Until no one’s worth isrendered

Bythe race,gender,class, or identity

They were born.Thismorn let it be sworn That we are oneone humankin, Grounded not justbythegriefs

We bear, but by the good we begin. To anyone out there:

I only ask thatyou care before it’stoo late, That youlive aware and awake, That youlead with love in hours ofhate.

I challenge youto heed thiscall, I dareyou to shape our fate. Above all,I dare youto do good So thatthe world mightbe great.

View Video of Presentation Here

writing.You’lldefinitelygetmorethanjustaverse forme.

AP:Whatkindofnovels?

GORMAN:IreallyliketodrawfromwhatIconsider tobemyliteraryancestorsZoraNealeHurstonor ToniMorrison,whowrotethisbeautifulprose,which Ithinkcameoutacultureoflanguagethatthey drewfromtheAfricanAmericancommunity.Ithink aboutthetitansofwritingwhosefootstepsIwould lovetodancein.

https://www.newslooks.com/amanda-gorman-unpoem-an-ode-we-owe/

Image credit: see page 69

African Stock Exchange/Bourse

•Algeria

Algiers Stock Market

•Angola Angola Stock Exchange and Derivatives

•Botswana Botswana Stock Exchange

•Cameroon 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

The Egyptian Exchange

•Ethiopia Ethiopia Commodity Exchange

•Ghana Ghana Stock Exchange

•Kenya Nairobi Stock Exchange

•Libya 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 Nigerian Stock Exchange

•Rwanda Rwanda Stock Exchange

•Seychelles Seychelles Securities Exchange

•Somalia Somali Stock Exchange

•South Africa Bond Exchange of South Africa Johannesburg Stock Exchange Johannesburg Stock Exchange

•South Sudan Khartoum Stock Exchange

•Swaziland Swaziland Stock Exchange

•Tanzania Dar es Salaam Stock Exchange

•Tunisia Tunisia Stock Exchange

•Uganda Uganda Securities Exchange

•Zambia Lusaka Stock Exchange

•Zimbabwe Victoria Falls Stock Exchange

•Zimbabwe Zimbabwe Stock Exchange

Lagos,

Africa DeÞes Global Trend With Funding for Startups Surging

By Antony Sguazzin, Samuel Gebre, and Rene Vollgraaff

AS FUNDING FOR startups falls across the globe,Africaisstandingoutasanotableexception, with its under-served population outweighing the impactofinflation and slowing economies.

Fundingforstartupsintheworld’ssecond-largest continentmorethandoubled to$3.14billion inthe first six months of the year, according to research firm Africa: The Big Deal. That compares with a decline ranging from 3.7% in Europe to 43% in LatinAmerican and the Caribbean.

“Macro trends affecting developed-market tech names will be less impactful to Africa. Klarna, Paypal, others are being hit by fears over inflation and what that means for consumer transactions,” said Lexi Novitske, a general partner with Norrsken22, anAfrica-focused tech fund that was setupbySwedishstartupfounders.“Africa’sstory is more around bringing the under-penetrated marketonline.”

If the trend continues, funding for startups may exceed the record $5 billion raised last year. Entrepreneurs are racing to provide services ranging from payment and health care to educational offerings to more than 1.2 billion people on the continent, which lacks adequate financial infrastructure and last-mile delivery. Still, the amount received byAfrican firmsis minuscule when compared with countries such as the US, wherecompaniesraised$123billioninthefirstsix months of the year,11% lessthan lastyear.

AfricaLeadsStartupFundingGrowth

Startup funding in Africa more than doubled in the first 6 months of 2022. For some investors, that shows the opportunity inAfrica.

“The African venture capital market is far less advanced than that of the developed markets,” saidAmrishNarrandes,headofprivateequityand

venturecapitalatCapeTown-based Futuregrowth Asset Management. “It follows that more growth can be expected in theAfrican market.”

Africa’sadvantagesrangefromtheundeveloped nature of its markets to a relatively young population who are quick to grasp the technology offeredbystartups.TheaverageageofanAfrican is 18, compared with 31 in South America and Asia, the next youngest continents, according to Visual Capitalist.

“Startup companies in Africa are solving real problems, where existing businesses either do not exist or do not have the dynamism to make changes,” according to the African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association. Traditional banks have failed to broaden access to financial servicesanddecrepitstatepostalservicesprovide opportunitiesfor delivery companies,itsaid.

Still, even within Africa hubs are growing at different speeds. In the six months through June, the amount of startup capital raised increased more than fourfold in Kenya, while it more than doubledinNigeria.Newfundingwaslittlechanged in SouthAfrica,according to Narrandes.

The pace of the increase will also likely ease in coming months as the economic woes elsewhere have some impact as many of the funding rounds were agreed upon months earlier, Novitske said.

“I do hear from many founders things are slower,”saidIdoSum,partneratTLcomCapital,a pan-African fund. Even so, “fundamentals are still very attractive, probably more than many other regions,” he said.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/ articles/2022-08-03/africa-defies-global-trendwith-funding-for-startups-surging

Dr.ImanAbuzeidisNowOneof aFewBlackWomen

a

Company

Series

By Ngozi Nwanji

DR. IMAN ABUZEID’S PIVOT into businesshasbeenfarworththeleap.

As previously reported by AfroTech, following her earning her medical degree, she co-founded Incredible Health — a platform that uses an algorithm to match hospitals to nurses — back in 2017. After two years, the San Francisco-based company raised $15 million in its SeriesAfunding round.

Now, Abuzeid has returned with a big win for healthcare workers and patients.

Big Boss Moves

OnAug. 17, Incredible Health announced that it

$1.65 billion

a

standsasoneofonlyafewBlackwomenfounders

wholeadsaunicorncompany,whichisonevalued atover $1 billion.

“As the highest valued tech-enabled career marketplaceinhealthcare,we’vetransformedhow nursesarehiredandwillbuildon thisworktohelp health systems and healthcare workers manage surging patient demand in the midst of a national labor crisis,”Abuzeid wrote ina blog post.

Investors In The Round

The round was led by Base 10 Partners as part of itsAdvancement Initiative — which donates 50 percentofthefund’scarriedinteresttoHistorically BlackColleges and Universities — per the post.

Participants included returning investors such as Andreessen Horowitz and Obvious Ventures, along with new investors Workday CEO Chano Fernandez, NBA star Andre Iguodala, Rethink Impact,StardustEquity, and the D’Ameliofamily’s 444 Capital Fund.

Funding To Support Beyond Nurses

In light of the new funding, Abuzeid is adamant that it will support her startup’s mission of helping healthcare workers have the opportunity to better lives, as well asliveouttheir dream roles.

“Nurses are the backbone of the US healthcare system and they deserve the well-staffed teams and tools to not only succeed, but also feel fulfilled in their careers,”Abuzeid added. “We’re excited to accelerate our growth to affect even more change for US healthcare workers and health systems.”

Thecompanyaimstoscalefurtheracross thenationandcreatemorerolesforthelikes ofdoctors,physicaltherapists,pharmacists, and more.

https://news.yahoo.com/dr-iman-abuzeidnow-one-172102092.html

Image credit: VentureBeat

African Union Procurement and TradeApps

The African 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 RepresentativeOffice,SpecialisedandTechnical Agencyand 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 installtheAUProcurementapponyourdevices.

TheAfCFTAHubbringstogethertheAfCFTA 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 AfCFTADigital Ecosystem - use what you need togetwhatyouwant.WhereveryouareinAfrica, we have got your back. Register your business to take advantage of access to the 41 countries that have ratified theAfCFTATreaty.

African Web 3 Super App Jambo Raises $7.5M in Seed Round

By Sandali Handagama

JAMBO, A THREE-MONTH-OLD COMPANY building a Web 3 super app for Africa, has raised $7.5 million in seed funding from an array of prominentbackersinthecryptoindustry,including Delphi Ventures, Coinbase Ventures and Three Arrows Capital.

Asuper app is a one-stop mobile application for multiple services such as ride-hailing, banking, communication and food delivery. Examples include China’s WeChat, India’s Paytm, and southeast Asia’s Grab, which was valued at $40 billionahead of its U.S. share-listinglast year.

Jambo wants to introduce young Africans to Web 3 financial ecosystems through play-to-earn gaming and decentralized finance (DeFi) services including currency exchanges and remittances.

“Honestly, anything that helps in Africa – send money, save money, make money – is what we're testingoffofthesuperapp,”co-founderandCEO

JamesZhangsaidinaninterview,addingthatthe core ofJambo isa digital wallet.

Africa has been a fast adopter of crypto: The continent’scryptomarketgrewbyover$100billion between July 2020 and June 2021, according to the World Economic Forum, which translates into value growth of about 1,200%.

ZhanggrewupintheDemocraticRepublicof Congo, and said his family had been in Africa forthreegenerations.AftergraduatingfromNew York University in 2017 with a degree in computer science, heran acryptofundfor fouryearsbefore starting work on Jambo.

According to a press statement shared with CoinDesk, other backers include Alameda Research and AllianceDAO. Jambo has also garnered the support of angel investors including DoKwon,co-founderandCEOofTerraformLabs, SandeepNailwal,co-founderandCEOofPolygon,

Jambo has builta network of ambassadors to offer courses on crypto in multiple cities acrossAfrica. JAMBO

and Web 3 investor Santiago R. Santos.

“What WeChat did in China, Jambo will do in Africa,” Santos said in the statement.

Zhang told CoinDesk that Jambo’s first goal is to educate young people in Africa about Web 3 and introducethem tothefinancialopportunitiesit offers.Onetargetuser-baseforJamboisuniversity students: In 2019, around 50% of university graduates in Africa were unemployed, according totheAfricanCenterforEconomicTransformation.

Since January, Jambo has signed up over 12,000 students across 15 African nations including Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa, Nigeria and Ethiopia to complete a Web 3 curriculum, designed to allow students to exploreopportunitiesinplay-to-earnandDeFi,the statement said.

“We'reliterallygoingcampusby campus. We're, I think, signing on one to two per week, started

aboutamonthago.We’reataroundmorethansix college campuses already. Hoping to enter 10 or 15 bythe end of [March],” Zhang said.

The startup is setting up local teams and offices in 15 countries to test and provide services that cater to the diversity of communities and nations acrossthe continent, according to Zhang.

“We have the long-term vision of realizing financialprosperityforbillionsacrossthecontinent andarecommittedtofosteringthenextgeneration of Web 3 innovators, builders, and creators,” he said.

The funds raised will go into operations and testingtheapp,whichwillgolivelatethisyear.

https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/02/21/ african-web-3-super-app-jambo-raises-75m-inseed-round/

Image credit: twitter.com/JamboTechnology

Climate Bill Could Create 1,000 New Companies

By Diana Olick

THE INFLATION REDUCTION ACT passed by Congress includes a $369 billion investment in climate and energy policies, the biggest investment in U.S. history to fight climate change. From tax breaks to direct subsidies, it has big implications for businesses in clean energy, clean manufacturingand clean innovation.

Its passage will be huge for startups in the climate space as well as the big venture capital firmsthat back them.

“Everybody wants to be part of this,” said Carmichael Roberts, co-leader of the investment committee at Breakthrough Energy Ventures, the climatefund founded by BillGates. “The callsthat I’mgettingnow—tremendous,already,andthere wasalreadyabiggroundswellaroundclimate,but thisjust reallyboosted even further.”

Roberts said the ability to manufacture in the United States, thanks to tax breaks and other incentives, is “transformative” for startups and will incite entrepreneurship. “I bet you there’s somewherebetween300to1,000companiesthat will exist now because of this bill that would not have existed,” said Roberts.

Startups in the climate space already are applaudingthepassage.Here’swhattheCEOsof some companies featured in CNBC’s Clean Start series have tosay:

• BlocPower, which aimsto electrifyevery building inAmerica, expects to see big tax breaks for both consumers and for the company itself. CEO Donnel Baird saidthe package “dramaticallylowers the costto building owners andhomeowners of clean energy upgrades.Itcreates a new Green Bank to provide flexible capital to clean energy projects that WallStreet can leverage.”

• ElectricHydrogen builds systems to produce green hydrogenpower. CEORaffiGarabedian said, “The policy rightlyacknowledges

hydrogen’s power to decarbonize heavy industry...and was designed to reward hydrogen producers who can minimize the carbon emissions.”

• EpicCleantec builds on-site water recycling systems for urban buildings. Its CEOAaronTartakovsy said, “We’rethrilled to see $4 billiondirected to aiding the Western States currently grappling with a very difficult drought, a challenge we at Epic are actively addressing.”

• IndigoAg helps farmers make cash from carbon credits by implementing green farming technologies.“The proposed $20 billioncommitment [in agriculture subsidies] would enable farmers to plant the seeds for ameaningful,long-term and durable climate solution,” said CEO Ron Hovespian.

• CityZenith creates digital twins of cities and buildings, right down to theirenergy operations. Bydoing so, it helps cities and developers lower their carbon footprints before they ever startconstruction. “This news could impact our share pricein the near futureand facilitate the close ofa large institutional investmentround later this year or early next year,” said CEO Michael Jansen.

Perhaps the biggest impact is that government investmentinclimateinitiativesandinnovationwill give private investors much more confidence in the climate space.

“Theventurecapitaldollarswillflowinalotfaster from areas that may not have been investing in an area, but now all of a sudden, see, wow, we’re going to have a real path to scale with the best and the brightest people, and the best companies being created. That’s what this bill overall does,” said Roberts.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/08/16/climate-billcould-create-1000-new-companies-breakthroughinvestor.html

Image credit: University of Exeter

Electric Batteries are Fueling the Shift from Petrol-Powered Bikes in Kenya

By Faustine Ngila

AT E-MOBILITY STARTUP Roam’s assembly plant in Nairobi, an engineer tests a new electric batteryhehasjustdesigned.Hemountsthebattery ononeofthewaitingbikes,loadsa150kg-metallic box on it and rides it round the warehouse. “See how silent and powerful it is? This is the future of two-wheelermobility,”co-founderandchairmanof Roam (formerly Opibus) Filip Gardler tellsQuartz.

OnAug. 16, the startup partnered with M-Kopa, a Nairobi-based clean energy financier to provide thousands of e-motorcycles to riders in Kenya, after becoming the first startup in the country to convert petrol-powered motorbikes to electric last year, starting with a fleet of 100.

“This is one of the biggest leaps for electric mobility in Africa. Enabling a pay-as-you go structure means users can benefit from reduced operational costs, allowing them to make as much as double the daily income from petrol motorcycles,” Gardler says.

After securing $7.5 million funding last year, his firm partnered with Uber to supply 3,000 electric motorcycles. And that set the stage for more e-motorcycle startups in the country, all looking to grab a slice of the growing motorbike market which has over 1.5 million riders in Kenya. A

March survey by Car & General indicates that the motorbike sector contributes 3.4% to the country’s GDP generating $10 million everyday.

OnAug. 26, Stima, a Nairobi e-motorcycle startup specializing in battery swapping announced a collaboration with Indian e-motorcycle manufacturer OneElectric to deploy 3,000 motorcycles in Nairobi before upscalingto othertowns.

Reducingcarbonemissions

Stima’s CEO Jason Gras tells Quartz that though he has operated in Chinese and EU e-battery markets he chose Kenya to set up the startup because it requires less capital to invest in green mobility.

“Inothermarkets, youspendmoreto cutcarbon emissions. Electric batteries here help in cutting 90% of the emissions made by petrol motorbikes. Those are 10 tons of carbon dioxide cut off in the e-motorcyclelifecycle.Theyarealso30%cheaper than petrol ones,” Gras explains.

In 2019 alone, air pollution caused around 5,000 premature deaths in Kenya, and investing in e-motorcycles has become a solution to saving lives.

E-motorcycles have a maximum acceleration of 95 km per hour, a load weight of 200 kg and each battery’spowerisdepletedafterridingfor100km. Their performance matches a 150 cc petrol bike, according to Gras. The pay-as-you ride varies per provider with Stima charging $2.3 per battery swap.

“We have an online monitoring platform for our e-batteries where we collect data about their performance. This helps us do predictive maintenance.Weaimtoofferourservicestoother e-mobility companies,” Gras says. Zero-emissionbikescomewithahigherinitial cost

High fuel costs, soaring maintenance costs and theenvironmentallydamagingnatureofpetrolbikes is now pushing more riders into e-motorcycles, whose batteries are maintenance free. “With an e-motorbike, there are no gears, clutches, air

filters, exhaust pipes to replace or engine oil to buy. I love the calm ride without loud noise,” says Joseph Kimani, a bodaboda (motorbike) rider in Rongai.

He says though, that users must pay a little higher than petrol bikes. “E-motorcycles will cost youbetween$1,300to$1,600comparedto$1,200 for petrol ones.”

The higher initial cost is all due to high taxes, which,accordingtoanothere-motorcycleprovider eBee, should be lowered by 45% to achieve a deeperpenetrationofe-mobility.“Thefiscalhurdle is currently quite high for e-bike import to Kenya. On top of the e-bike price, you’ll have to add 25% import duty, 16% value added tax, 2.25% import declaration fee and 1.5% railway development levy,” it noteson its website. Onlinedeliverystartupsarerelyingon e-motorcyclestocutemissions

The startup, which has been the logistics choice for e-commerce and food delivery startups like Jumia, Glovo, Domino’s, Pizza Inn, Bolt Food and Artcaffe in Nairobi was used to make 10,000 deliverieslastyearandnowwantstogrowitsfleet to 500. It charges a weekly usage fee of $23 and has been helping itsclients cut carbonemissions.

For Kiri EV, also Nairobi-based, the battery swapping fee is $8.3 per month. Users can downloadanapptolocateswappingstationsnear them.JustlikeStima,thestartupalsomonitorsthe bikes against theft while remotely controlling the

ROAM Launches First Electric Mass-Transit Bus in Africa

ROAM SHARED news

of its mass transit bus in a press release. According to the company, the Rapid bus features priority seats for the elderlyandpeoplewithlimited mobility, extended legroom, and designated areas for wheelchairs, in addition to a low-floor entry for easier commuter access.

The company stated that inaddition to providing countries like Kenya with zero-emission mobility solutions,ithopestheRapidelectricbuscancreate a new perception of public transport vehicles by providing a solution that is “inclusive, modern, efficient, and sustainable.”

The solution Roam brings to the Kenyan market enablesustomovepeoplesafely,comfortablyand timely in both a sustainable and affordable way. The bus is designed not onlyto increase comforts and lower cost but more importantly focuses on

the well-being of the population through reduced noise pollution and eliminating local emissions, improving airquality for the cities acrossAfrica.

By going electric, operational costs can be loweredbyupto50%,enablinghighermarginsfor theoperatorbutalsolowercostforthecommuters. toensuretheelectricbusesareassembledlocally, but also partly manufactured in the region. This can provide more local jobs and help to tackle the rising unemployment rate in Kenya.

https://electrek.co/2022/08/23/roam-first-electricmass-transit-bus-africa/

batteries for optimum performance. Like Roam, it hasnowmovedintoassemblingarangeofelectric scootersandmotorcyclesatitsproductionplantin Nairobi.

Jua Bike has invested in the business of renting out e-motorcycles and e-trikes, and after-market servicing in its mission of making “electric bikes affordable and accessible to everyone through subscription.”

Whileestimatesshowthat$2billionisneededto convert all petrol motorbikes in Kenya to electric, the current efforts are a step in the right direction with the country leading the e-mobility charge in

Africa. There are also many e-vehicle startups –suchasBasiGo,NopeaRide,EVMAfrica,Solar Impulse, Caetano, and AgiliteeAfrica.

even with the government’s plan to increase EV ownership of all vehicles to 5% by 2025, there is an urgent need for more investments in electric charging stations with Nairobi having only seven stations.

4 Vital Questions That Business Leaders Must Answer

By Peter Cohan

MYFAVORITETHINGaboutteachingisquestion andanswersessions.OnAugust25,Iparticipated inaQ&Asessionwithtwoentrepreneurswho had read my book, Hungry Start-Up Strategy

This brought to mind a basic question: What are the vital questions from investors, customers, employees, suppliers, and others that business leaders must answer to keep their companies growing.

While not comprehensive, I came up with four vital questions for company success and how businessleaders can find compelling answers.

1. How large is your addressable market and how fast is it growing?

This question is vital because if there is no marketforyourproduct,youwillbeunabletobuild abusiness around it.

Investors and employees care about market size and growth because theywanttobeton orwork for a company with the potential to go public--which means it must reach $100 million in revenue while growing faster than 30 percent a year. If the company can go public, venture capitalists will generate a return on their investment (ROI) and employees' stock options will become valuable.

Venture capitalists expect a company to gain no more than 10 percent of a market. So to reach this scale and growth rate, aim your company at an addressable market of at least $1 billion. Of course, investorsprefermuchlargermarkets

and will probe for assurance that the market size you provide them is truly addressable--e.g., customersinthat marketwillpayfor your product.

Here are three tips to help answer this question:

» Seek out credibleresearchthat quantifies the size and growth of your target market.

»If such studies do not exist, develop an estimate based on the number of potential customers, how many unitsof product they will buy each year,and the unit price.

»Interview potential customers so you can estimate how much ofthat marketsize your company can address.

2. What is your current market share and how will you increase it?

Businesses often participate in a portfolio of

markets.AsIwroteinDisciplinedGrowthStrategies

(DGS), large companies often get most of their revenue from markets that are slowing down or getting smaller. At the same time, they should be investing in new markets that are growing very rapidly.

Business leaders seek to hold on to their piece of the maturing market pie while boosting their share in the fast-growing new markets. This matters to investors, customers, and employees because, unless your company is gaining market share, you are falling behind the competition.And the longer that persists, the greater the risk that your company will suffer a drop in its valuation, lack the funds to build better products, and need to cuttalented employees.

To answer this question, do these fivethings:

»Use credible market studies to estimate your marketshareand its recent trends.

»If that does not exist, divide your revenues bythe total market size to approximate your marketshare.

»As detailed in DGS,ask customers which factorsthey use to choose between your company and competitors, how well your company meets these customer purchase criteria (CPC),and whether you are improving your competitive position.

»Track customer retention and how much customersbuy over time.

»Launch new productsthat meet CPC better than competing ones.

3. How much capital does your company need and what return can investors expect?

To keep growing, you must raise the capital to hire people, buy raw materials, build factories, develop new products and processes,and open salesoffices.

Tell potential capital providers how much money you need and how much of a return they can expect. Employees who know that your company is making high payoff investments in future growth are more motivated to workhard.

As I described in DGS, here's how to estimate your required capital and ROI:

»Develop growth trajectoriesfor your company.

»Build implementation plans to estimate the investmentrequired and theresulting increase in yourcompany's cash flow.

»Forecast futureusesand sources of cash over the next decade,and calculate the net present value of the investment required.

4. How long is your company's cash runway?

Thesedaysthereisafourthvital questionwhich I lack the space to addresshere:

• How can your company cut costs to extend its capital balance without sacrificing long-term growth?

Here are two caveats. First, these questions may not be equally important to every industry and company. What's more, leaders who lack an appetite for math should consider collaborating with an expert in strategy and finance to answer them.

If you can answer the fourth question now, your company will be around when the current capital winter ends -- and the first three vital questions I describedherebecomeevenmoreparamount. https://www.inc.com/peter-cohan/4-vitalquestions-that-business-leaders-must-answer.

Image credit: blog.timespacemedia.com,mg.co.

10 Questions Your Pitch Deck Needs To Answer

By Alejandro Cremades

IF YOU WANT to raise money for your startup, yourpitchdeckneedstoanswerthese10important questions. This is something that will help you to hit it out of the part when you are wondering how to value a startup also.

Many new entrepreneurs see their pitch deck as theopportunitytoshowofftheirbusinessidea,and how smart, innovative, and fantastic they and their technology is. What a pitch deck is really about is answering the key questions that investors have. So that they can quickly make a decision to fund you.

Investors are bombarded with more pitches than theycouldeverfund.Theydon’thavetimetogoto extra lengths to extract this basic data from you. So,ifyouwanttogetfundingforyourstartup,make sure your deckanswers these key questions.

1. What Is The Problem You Are Solving?

Theproblemyourstartupissettingouttosolveis theverybasisforyourbusiness.Itisthefoundation of everything else.

Ifyoudon’thaveagoodproblem,notmuchelseis goingtomatter.While ifyouhaveastrongproblem, investors will often stick with you as you continue to iterate to find the right product, marketing, and team tosolve it.

State your problem simply and clearly. Be ready to explain how you’ve verified and quantified the problem after your pitch.

2. How Big Is The Market?

One of the top questions investors have is how bigyour market is.

This is vital for determining whether your startup can ever reach the size that is needed to deliver

the level of returns that they need to justify this investment.

You may need to zoom out even further to demonstratethefullpotential.Orreferencecredible data on how large this market is expected to grow over the next few years.

Of course, experienced investors also know that it is going to take great focus to get traction, score early wins, and to make the most of the capital you are given. So, also show the size of the niche group that you will begin selling to first

3. Who Are Your Target Customers?

Investorswanttoknowwhoyourtargetcustomers are. There are multiple reasons for this.

Firstly, it tells them that you have really done the work, and know your market. It shows if your business idea really makes sense

This information also allows investors to gauge the fit for them and their portfolios. If they have experience, contacts, or complimentary verticals, theycanaddalotofvaluetoyourcompanybeyond their capital. They may be able to easily plug it in and make it a far larger success in a very short period of time.

4. Do You Have A Finished Product?

Therearecertainlyinvestorswhomayinvest just based upon the idea, or a prototype. What’s most

importantisthatyouareclear about the stage of business that you are at.

The further along you are, thelowertheriskforpotential investors.

How much you’ve invested or raised to get to this stage alsotellsthemalotaboutyou andyourcapabilities.Ifyou’ve bootstrappedyourwayallthe way through to getting some users for your first MVP or beta test, then they can hope you’ll accomplish a lot more with some real money in the bank.

That’s in contrast to someone that has been working on a product for four years, only has a prototype, and no sales. Even worse, if they’ve spent tens of thousands of dollars on a prototype that could have been made inagarageforacouplehundreddollarsinaweek.

5. How Many Units Have You Sold?

Like the stage of your product this tells investors alotabouthowfaryou’vegottenwithyourprevious resources.Aswellasyourabilitytosell.Ifyoucan’t sellanycustomers,then youprobably aren’tgoing to be able to preserve their capital, much less generate positive returns.

Evenhavingpre-soldahandfulofunits,orhaving amassed a few thousand freemium users is better than nothing.

The data you present here will also show them whether or not you have really hit product market fit yet, or not.

Isyourcapitalgoingtobeusedtokeeptweaking and exploring the market, or simply scaling what you have already done successfully?

6. How Are You Marketing & Selling Your Product?

Thisisanotherveryrevealingfactorthatinvestors are interested to learn aboutduring pitches.

It is another factor which quickly differentiates those dreamers with no real business experience

from those that really know what they are doing, and have found their groove already.

Your marketing and sales channels can also provide a valuable moat around your business, staving off the competition, and reducing risk for investors.

7.WhatAreYourProfitMargins?

Profit margins are important for three main reasons.

First, and most importantly, it shows if you truly have a viable business. One which can make enough to survive, and sustain itself. Even under pressure from competitors.

Secondly,itshowshowscalable thecompanyis. Isthereenoughprofittogrowandforgepartnerships and engage in new distribution methods?

Thirdly, it shows the types of returns investors can expect you to generate per dollar invested in the company.

Of course, you should have already researched industry benchmarks and know where you are in relation to those.

8. How Fast Has Your Company Been Growing?

Growth is one of the top reasons that investors choose to allocate their capital to startups. Your traction and rate of growth is more important than size

The younger your startup is, the faster investors usually expect you to be growing.

9.WhoAreYourCompetitors?

Yourcompetitionisnotalwaysathreat.They can actually be validation for you being in business, your valuation, and how much you are asking to raisein this round.

10.WhoIs TheTeam?

Show off your cofounding team, advisors, and otherkeytalent.Theyare oneofyourmostvaluable assets. https://www.itnewsafrica.com/2022/09/10questions-your-pitch-deck-needs-to-answer/ Imagecredit: slidemembers.com

Investment These Four Countries are Leading Africa’s Start-up Scene

By Ivor Price

UNPERTURBED BYTHE COVID-19pandemic, international investors have continued to pour money into the African continent’s start-up scene — but that influx of cash is not being distributed evenly.

In fact, the vast majority of venture capital in Africaisscoopedupbyjustfourcountries:Nigeria, Egypt,SouthAfrica and Kenya,Africa’s“big four.”

According to the African Development Bank’s (AfDB) 2021 report, these four countries account for about a third of the continent’s start-up incubators and accelerators and receive 80% of foreign direct investment(FDI) intoAfrica.

TheAfricantech start-upsceneis growing

The seventh edition of Disrupt Africa’s African Tech Startups Funding Report revealed that start-ups in the big four raised a combined $1.9 billion in 2021 — about 92.1% of the overall total investmentsraisedinAfricaforthatyear.Thelatest figuresare,infact,partofayears-longtrendofthe big-four dominance inAfrica’s start-up scene.

Funding secured by Nigeria, Egypt, South Africa and Kenya has continually increased over the years: from a 79.4% share in 2018, to 87.5% in 2019 andthen 89.2%in 2020.

Thesefiguresstandinsharpcontrasttothecash raised by countries like Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Tanzania, all of which still record a low level of start-up investment activity.

While capital funding is undoubtedly on the rise in Africa, it is becoming more concentrated in the big-four countries. According to the 2021 Disrupt Funding report, non-big-four African countries raised $170,607,500. That is just 7.9% of the continent’s total.

The report also indicates that more than 40% of thatfundingwassecuredbystart-upsfromGhana, Morocco and Tunisia. According to one report, Algeria raised $30 million in start-up funding; Morocco raised $29 million and Tunisia raised

$23 million in venture funding in 2021. These investments are relatively minor compared to the funding raised by the big-four countries in Africa year after year.

HowAfrica’s“bigfour”tookthelead

According to the African Development Bank (AfDB), the “big four” countries push ahead faster thanotherAfricancountrieswhenitcomestostartupinvestmentandfundinginlargepartasaresult oftheirlargeeconomiesandsizeablepopulations.

Nigeria, for example, with its GDP of roughly $440bn and population of 206 million,is projected to be the third largest country by population in the world by 2050. This makes Nigeria an attractive location for start-up investment inflows. Likewise, Egypt, Kenya and SouthAfrica boast some of the largest economies inAfrica, with $404bn, $110bn and $420bn GDPrespectively.

The large populations — Egypt has 102 million inhabitants, while SouthAfrica has 59 million and Kenya53million— ofthebigfour countriesserve as solid foundations for returns on venture capital investment. However, population and GDP alone are not the full story. There are other more subtle factors required to drive investment toward startups.

Countries like Tanzania and Ethiopia are yet to secure anywhere near the huge venture investments the big four regularly pull in, despite their sizeable populations of 59 and 115 million respectively. Island states like Mauritius and the Seychelles,whichboasthigherpercapitaincomes, are yet to increase their venture investments despite their high levels of wealth and favourable regulatory environments for start-ups.

Researchshowsthatalackoffintechinnovation alsocontributestothelowlevelsofstart-upfunding in someAfrican countries.

Indeed, the four biggest African tech hubs also attract the most fintech funding in the continent.

Undoubtedly, African countries that lack fintech solutions are less likely to secure high start-up funding and investments.

Other factors, such as the availability of economic resources, political and socioeconomic constraints and poor financial systems also hamper the attractiveness of investing in many African countries. Indeed, the high levels of FDI in the big four allows them to access the continent’s investments and paves the wayforthem tofurtherexpand theirdominance of Africa’s tech scene.

Howtherestcan catchup

Todriveventureinvestmentsinthecontinent,itis criticalthatAfricancountriesbegintoprovidefiscal and non-fiscal incentives for venture capitalists to invest in the financial and tech sectors. African governments in non-big-four countries must also improve their legal and institutional environment soastocreateahospitableinvestmentecosystem

for investors and start-ups. This would not only transform the investment landscape of non-bigfour countries but would make them an attractive destination for start-up investments inAfrica.

Countries can use the African Continental Free TradeArea(AfCFTA)asatooltowininvestments.

ThroughtheAfCFTA,Africangovernmentsinnonbig-four African countries can attract increased start-up funding by reducing investment barriers and improving investment governance within their respective countries.

ThesuccessofNigeria,Egypt,KenyaandSouth Africa is not only something for each country and its population to be proud of — it is also evidence that innovation will flourish anywhere, given the right conditions.

East to west and north to south, Africans are young, ambitious and smart. If given the right toolstodiveintotechandtherightregulationsare introduced,thecontinent’snascenttechscenewill flourish.

https://ventureburn.com/2022/08/these-four-countries-areleading-africas-start-up-scene/

This article was written byAimée Dushime for the World Economic Forum

Image credits: theindependentghana.com,This Day, nigerianeye.com

Hans Osnabrugge and Dean Hiine, cofounders

South Africa’s Talk360 Raises $4M to Build Single Payment Platform for Africa

By Annie Njanja

MANY BUSINESSES looking to set up panAfrican operations are often met with the challenge of establishing payment services that are appropriate for each country they go to. Most of the payment services merchants working in the continent havesolutionsthatarelimited tospecific regions, meaning that businesses have to sign dealswithmultipleproviderstocaterfortheunique preferences of their users in different countries. This is a gap that Talk360 is looking to bridge as it creates a new payment platform that will integrate all available payment options across Africa. This product, it says, will open up businesses to the largest pool oflocalizedpayment optionsinAfrica.

Meanwhile, the startup is also looking to expand its international calling operations across Africa after closing a $4 million seed funding round, led byHAVAÍC.The4DiCapitalandanumberofangel investorsthatincludeGastonAussems(ex-Mollie), Robert Kraal (ex-Adyen), Gabriel de Montessuss (President WorldPay International) and Marnix van der Ploeg (ex-Booking.com and EQT), also participated in the round.

While saying that the calling business will continue to grow in Africa, Talk360 co-founder and managing director for Africa Dean Hiine told TechCrunch he anticipates great growth for its payment platform, which he says will also make it easy for international merchants to sell to users in Africa too. He added that the startup decided to build its own payment platform informed by the

need to make payment and checkout easy for its users in Africa.

Currently, the startup works through integrations with older payment service providers, which are majorly limited by region-specificity. Hiine sayshis new platform will bring all the “scattered payment methods” across Africa on a common platform, which he believes will positively impact Talk360’s bottom line, and that of other merchants that will use its platform.

Talk360, a leading Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) player in Africa, enables people to make internationalcallsthroughitsappforafee,anditis built in such a way that only the initiator needs the app and internet – a smartphone– to make calls.

“In our calling business we identified some unique problems around digital payment in Africa. The payment methods are scattered and payment processes are lengthy…And we could see that this problem had a serious impact on our bottom line in terms of conversion rate we were seeing in Africa…Itisaproblemweexperiencedandweare tryingtosolveforothermerchantswithapresence inthecontinenttoobymakingtheprocessfastand easy,” saidHiine.

“Wearebuildingtheplatformtoactuallyincrease our conversion rate by giving the user experience one single checkout, and to some level, offer predictive analysis– to tell the preferred methods of payment for that region and offer them as top options for the user,” said Hiine, also Brooklyn Ventures Africa co-founder, a vc firm that has invested in startups in technology, media, and oil and gas sectors.

The Talk360 calling app connected 2 million people last year and has paying users in 170 countries so far, and this number is set to grow as thestartupbeginsrampingupitsmarketingefforts

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and expansion plans, which include setting up a hub in Kenya.

Talk360 was co-founded by Hiine, Hans Osnabrugge, and Jorne Schamp in 2016 as a traveling app (used to avoid roaming charges). However, the co-founders were forced to rethink theirstrategyaftersocialmediaappslikeWhatsApp introduced internet calls.

They rebuilt to accommodate the digitallymarginalized individuals by removing the requirementfor theperson atthe end of the call to

have an internet connection or theapp.

Talk360’spartnershipswithagentslikePesaPoint in Kenya and Flash in South Africa, also enables userstopurchaseairtimevouchersfromanetwork of over 750,000 physical points of sale.

South Africa, Zimbabwe and Bangladesh are some of the markets where the calling app is widelyused.

https://techcrunch.com/2022/05/31/south-africastalk360-raises-4m-to-build-single-paymentplatform-for-africa

ONE MONTH AFTER GRADUATING from the UniversityofLagosinNovember2017,TimiBolaji received an offer to become a software engineer at Microsoft after scaling through a process that wasfocusedonhiringcomputersciencegraduates fromAfricanuniversities.Hejoinedthecompany’s team in Seattle a year later and has been there since, working on the Xbox Cloud Gaming team. Microsoft is returning to Africa to hire more developers like Bolaji, with the same tantalizing promiseofrelocatingthemtoofficesintheUSand Canada.

Thecompanyisinterestedinpeoplestillenrolled inor who have recentlycompleteda bachelor’s or master’sdegreeinengineering,computerscience orrelatedfields,andhaveoneyearofprogramming

experience in languages like Java, Python and PHP.Beingabletoshowanunderstandingofdata structures and algorithmsisalso required.

Microsoft isn’t the only Big Tech company directly fishing for new talent in Africa. Amazon is currently interviewing Nigerian developers for roles that promise relocation to Ireland and Canada. These moves coincide with the growth of software engineering talent in Africa in the last decadethanksinparttotheworkofcompanieslike Andela that have helped produce the continent’s estimated 716,000 developers. Some of them have become startup founders who then hire developers, creating a ripple effect that inspires young students to consider careers in software engineering.

Microsoft is Leading Big Tech’s Push to Relocate African Developers to North America

By Alexander Onukwue

African developers are in global demand

Microsoft and Amazon may simply be seeking a slice of an already globalizing African software engineering workforce since four out of ten developersinAfricaworkforatleastonecompany based outside of thecontinent.

With the so-called Great Resignation of the last two years, “there’s a global shortage of talent and people are recognizing Africa as a source of talent,” says Chika Nwobi, founder and CEO of Decagon, a Nigerian company that runs cohortbased software engineering training programs. He is certain that BigTech companies will find the quality of talent they need in Nigeria because of the growth in expertise that has led to a vibrant tech-drivenfinancial services ecosystem.

“Wemaynothavethatmanyengineerswhocan operate at the scale of these large companies, but that’s just an implementation hurdle that’s easy to hop over, at the risk of trivializing it,” says Justin Irabor, a developer who works remotely in Nigeria for a European company. “As with all kinds of professions, there is a wide variation of talent quality, but I strongly believe we have good engineers here.”

By going directly to universities for candidates that do not necessarily have years of experience,

Microsoft’s betting on the diffusion of the innovation buzz from African tech companies and communities typically based in cities like Lagos, Nairobi, and Kigali to other parts of each country. The Windows maker may have to thank its competitor, Google, whose developer groupson campuses have becomea key channel introducing young African undergraduates to the world of software development.

Acredit toAfrican universities?

Many of the students that may apply to join MicrosoftfromNigeriaareprobablyathomedueto astrikebytheAcademicStaffUnionofUniversities (ASUU), the union for lecturers in governmentowned universities, now in its seventh month. There’sno end in sight.

Still,itisasignofthematuringcomputerscience programsinsomeschoolsinAfrica thatoneofthe world’s biggest companies is seeking students or recent graduates. Africa’s top universities for engineering and computer science are in Egypt and Tunisia, according to the US News and World Report’s 2022 ranking. Greater Big Tech interest could be the catalyst for schools in other parts of the continent to compete for places on such rankings in the future. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/microsoftleading-big-tech-push-110700389.html

Ugandan Online TV Bridges Information Gap for the Deaf

By Elias Biryabarema

▲Professional sign language interpreter and Productions Lead at Signs TV Uganda Susan Mujaawa, outside their studios. ►Professional sign Language interpreter Jonan Opori, Productions Lead at Signs TV Uganda Susan Mujaawa and Signs TV Uganda Team Leader Simon Eropu at their studioin Kabalagala suburb of Kampala, Uganda July 18, 2022. REUTERS/Abubaker Lubowa REUTERS/Abubaker Lubowa

WHEN SUSAN MUJAWA ANANDA heard a deaf man had been shot and wounded in Uganda for breaking a curfew during the pandemic his familysaidheknewnothingabout,sheresolvedto setupanonlinetelevisionchannelfordeafpeople.

"The reason why he was shot ... is because he didn'tknowwhatwashappeninginthecountry.He didn't know that there was a curfew," Ananda, a sign language interpreter, told Reuters.

Late last year, she teamed up with a deaf friend, Simon Eroku, and after winning a grant they founded SignsTV, which runs news bulletins for deafpeople,delivered by deaf people.

Slightly over a million people in Uganda, out of a total populationofabout45million,haveahearing disability and most of them have limited access to TV news due to a lack of sign language services on established channels.

The new station, which made its first broadcast in April and employs eight staff including four deaf anchors, operates from a studio in a Kampala suburb.

In a typical broadcast on SignsTV Uganda, the newsisreadbytwodeafanchorsandsimultaneously

signedbyasignlanguageinterpreter,goingslowly to match the anchor's pace, while the screen also carries subtitles.

ThedeafmanwhosestorymovedAnandatoact, wasshot in the legin a village in northern Uganda in April 2020, by a member of the Local Defence Unit (LDU), a para military force that sometimes operates alongside regular police and the military. His leg later had to be amputated. Police at the time told local media they would investigate. They were not available for new comment on the case.

For now, SignsTV Uganda produces only one weeklynewsrounduponSaturdaysduetofinancial, staffingandtechnicalconstraints,butAnandasaid it had ambitions to expand its offer. Up to about 800 viewers have watched individual bulletins so far and the numbers are growing.

"We want to have sports, we want to have talkshows,wewanttohavenews,"shesaid,adding music could also be a possibility.

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/ ugandan-online-tv-bridges-information-gapdeaf-2022-08-04/

The Limitless Metaverse: Not Just a Moment, but a Movement

By Alexandra Bower

AS THE TSUNAMI of change rears and roars with pandemics, global warming, digitization and crumbling social structures washing overus,we’relookingfornew tools to manage our anxiety and become more resilient. The metaverse is emerging as an alternative existence, one which will grow exponentially as real life becomes more difficult due to political unrest and environmental decline. As future generations become more immersedin this world,thelines between IRLand virtual willbecome increasingly blurred.

FaithPopcorn,the“Original Futurist,” and Cathy Hackl, the host ofAdweek’s Metaverse Marketing podcast, took the stage on day five of Brandweek with host Tiana Holt to discuss the magic of the Metaverse and their expertise in this evolving space thatcan no longer be ignored. The future is now

The metaverse paves new pathways for how people will engage with one another. People will socialize, work, learn, shop and meet their friends and significant others within these virtual spaces. The duo agrees that brands that think they still have time to get involved in the metaverse are risking being leftbehind.

“Ifyou’rethinking,‘Oh,thefutureisgoingtostart later.Wedon’tneed toworryaboutthe metaverse right now. We have time,’ you’re wrong,” Popcorn said. “That’s how they missed home delivery and bottled water. The metaverse is not maybe or if. It’s here now, and it’s actually crowning IRLout.”

Unlocking the imagination of the brand

According to Hackl, the metaverse presents

brandsandmarketerswithauniqueopportunityto reimagine themselvesand their career paths.

“Your brand’s DNA must be reimagined for the metaverse. It’s not an IRL copy,” she explained. “It must be widely flexible, artful and expansive. This is your chance to evolve and reimagine your career, too, as a brand marketer, as different titles and roles in marketing emerge within the metaverse.”

This reimagining gives brands the creativity and flexibility to try new things and think outside the box.

“Justbecauseyou sell deodorantin the physical world does not mean you need to sell deodorant in the virtual world. You can think outside of the box and create something completelynew,” Hackl said.

The end of brand-first

The panelists told the crowd that one of the biggest advantages for consumers of the metaverse is that it ushers in the gamification of marketing while ending the brand-first approach thatmanymarketersandbrandshavetraditionally taken. https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/thelimitless-metaverse-not-just-a-moment-but-amovement/

Image credit: SeanT. Smith Photography for Adweek

Afropolitan is Building the First-Ever Internet Country to Create Opportunities for theAfrican Diaspora

By Samantha Dorisca

MANY BELIEVE BLACK communities will find freedominadigitalworld.Community-as-a-service company Afropolitan is creating its own to support the masses in buildingabundant lives.

What Sparked The Pivot Toward A Digital World

Founders Eche Emole and Chika Uwazie are building a digital ecosystem to bolster economic activity within the Black community through their brainchild Afropolitan. The idea bloomed after a successfullineupofevents,festivals,andconcerts inAfricathatgeneratednearly$2billion.Emolewas looking to continue the momentumuntil COVID-19 forced them to rework their idea.

“Come2020,wewerethinking,‘Hey,we’regoing toreloadthis.’‘Thisisgoingtobesignificant.’Then COVID happens and the question was, ‘What doesapivotlooklikeinthisspacewherethereare no in real life events?’” Emole told AfroTech in an exclusiveinterview.

Afropolitan Will Be Built In Four Phases

Afropolitan steps into the power of the collective and reimagines a new world. The mission will be made possible in four phases: Events to connect Black communities globally, leveraging media to scale, building partner networks, and pushing for full-scale sovereignty

“We want to layer on top of that digital country because the purpose for which we’re building this community at scale is to allow us to withdraw our colonial borders,” Emole said. “It’s much harder to say,‘Let’sallmovebacktoAfrica.’ Whatifinstead of migrating physically, you can migrate online? This would allow us to scale in ways that were previously unimaginable before. That’s what we’re building here.”

Afropolitan Embraces

Web3, Set To Launch Super App

The digital country will tap into the Web3 space as Bitcoin will be the main currency. Black communities statistically experience difficulties with banking or established institutions globally. So, Afropolitan will encourage Black communities to move their money into a super app during phase two. Here, users can send and receive money across borders seamlessly, gather risk capital, and begin e-residency applications, among others.

“Black people globally, we are very great at creating value, but we are poor at capturing it,” Emolesaid.“Bybuildingthisentireflow,wesolvefor distribution, infrastructure, and for the ecosystem.”

Founders Embrace Emerging Technology To Keep Vision Alive

New ideas invite new technology. Afropolitan is embracing the current cryptocurrency wave. However, it will not hesitate to pivot when new technology emerges.

“Technologyisnottheendall,beall.Itjustallows us to leverage. If there’s better tech that comes, we will utilize that too,” Emole shared. “We are not a maxi to Web3. We’re a maxi to progress, opportunity, and utility. We’re not saying we want todie onthehillofEthereumorSolana.We dieon the hill of progressand prosperity for our people.”

Afropolitan Raises $2.1M

Although the fruition of the digital world could take a decade, the idea is gaining the attention of top venture capitalists within the tech space. Afropolitan recently raised $2.1 million in a preseed round led by Balaji Srinivasan. Olugbenga Agboola of Flutterwave, Walter Baddoo of 4DX Ventures, VC firm Hashed, and Atlantica Ventures — among others — also participated in the round.

“Weareconnectedwiththetopventurecapitalists and top partnerships in this space. The beauty of this being a community-led race is the network of people who are backing us across the world,” Emolesaid.

He continued: “We are building a network of abundance because for too long we have seen scarcity destroy our ability to move forward as

Black people. We have never really created a nation-state or country through reflection and choice. It’s always been through accident and force, so what we are saying is we’re utilizing a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) to buildsomething throughreflection and choice.”

Join the Digital Nation

Ready to Engage With Customers in the Metaverse?

Here’s What You Need to Know

By Matt Kates

WITH AN ESTIMATED market value of more than $1 trillion in yearlyrevenue,themetaverseis quickly emerging as a significant opportunity for brands to engage customers and create a community of loyal advocates.

While it provides a wealth of marketing opportunities, the metaverse — a set of interconnected virtual reality (VR) worlds where people can interact with others, explore and create — also introduces a new levelof complexityintocustomer experiences and raises many questions for brands. How can you connect the metaverse to traditional marketing activities? How do customers want to engage with brands in the metaverse — and do they even wanttoengageinthemetaverse in thefirstplace?

Clarus Commerce recently conducted a survey inquiring about consumer interest in metaverseactivations.According to our findings, consumers would be most interested in virtual concerts (38%), shopping at virtual stores (31%) and playing virtual games (31%). Furthermore, 45% of surveyed

consumers said they could be motivated to visit a brand store in the metaverse for a discount ofsometype.

Clearly, the metaverse holds value for brands and their customers. So, what considerationsandbestpractices do brands need to keep in mind as they prepare to engage with consumers in this new and exciting space? With consumer concerns over data sharing online and substantial barriers to entry, the metaverse requires thorough planning and the right strategy that’s accessible, thoughtful and creative.

3ConsiderationsBefore EnteringtheMetaverse

Themetaverseisfullofexciting and immersive elements for consumers, but joining it can be adauntingtaskforbrands.That’s why you need to do research first and understand how your audience wants to engage in the metaverse — and what holds them back from participating already.

Our survey revealed three considerations to keep in mind beforedivingintothemetaverse:

BarrierstoEntry

The metaverse is expensive and the price tag may bar some consumers from joining. To experience the most immersive aspects of the metaverse, consumers must purchase VR headsets, which range from $300to$1,400dependingonthe model. According to our survey, only 31% of respondents are willing to spend more than $150 on a VR headset. Consumers’ willingness and ability to pay for access to the metaverse could limit the number of customers available to test your brand’s new metaverse offerings.

However, some brands (like Roblox and Decentraland) offer consumers the ability to virtually engage with their metaverse offerings beyond VR.Alternative options include smartphones, gaming consoles, computers and augmented reality (AR) glasses.Theaccessibilityofyour metaverse offerings should be tailored to your brand and target audience. Identify opportunities to create more accessible, parallel experiences so all of your customers are included. For example, offer a streaming concert on a variety of devices in parallel to a 3D metaverse concert.Inadditiontoincreasing participation, the streaming concert can serve as an entry

point to transition consumers to future metaverse concerts.

DataPrivacyConcerns

Privacy concerns are top of mind for consumers operating digitally — and the metaverse is no exception. Given the nascency of the metaverse concept, it’s not surprising that 46% of respondents said one of their main concerns for entering themetaverseisuncertaintyover how brands will use their data. However, many consumers also said they’re comfortable sharing their email addresses (50%), names (43%) and gender (39%) in exchange for an exclusive experience with a brand in the metaverse.

While every brand wants to collect valuable zero-party data — i.e., data that a consumer intentionally and proactively shares with a brand — data requestscanalsocreatebarriers to metaverse participation. That means it’s important to consider consumers’ security concerns and preferences about how you collect their data. Ensure your data collection strategy is transparent and flexible so customers feel confident their personal information is safe whenengaginginthemetaverse. Showing consumers how you use data to better personalize their experience can also help make customers feel more comfortable sharing.

The metaverse also presents many unique opportunities to observationally collect data. For example, customer participation in virtual activities (e.g., using a metaverse avatar to try on a brand’s clothing or accessories)

can provide valuable insight into a consumer’s passions and interests.

TheRoleofNFTs

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) — digital assets that show ownershipofadigitalorphysical item — are the new buzzword in the retail metaverse and beyond. But are they worthwhile investments? When it comes to customer loyalty programs, shopperscouldpurchaseorearn NFTs to unlock VIP perks, deals andrewards.Orconsumerscould collect NFTs as branded digital collectibles with intrinsic value from their favorite brands. For example,Gap recentlylaunched a gamified collectible NFT experience allowing customers to purchase a limited-edition Gap hoodie. The experience was designed to further engage and expand Gap’s community of brand evangelists.

With more traditional rewards, the more customers redeem them, the more it can cost your brand. But if you offer digital rewards like NFTs, it’s a fixed cost. NFTs are an easily scalable incentive that can create urgency with only a one-time investment. Consider AMC, which offered NFTs to its loyalty program members that purchased advanced tickets to a showing of “Spider-Man: No Way Home.”The promotion was designed to drive consumers back to the movie theater, rather than wait for them to stream the film at home.

Even though the NFT market has cooled off from its peak, consumers are still excited about the offering. In fact, 17%

of respondents said NFTs are a fun collectible and it doesn’t matter if their value fluctuates, and 14% said they're a good long-term investment. Because NFTs aren't widely accepted by consumers yet, it’s important to pilotandtestNFTstogaugeyour customers’ interest level and participation. This principle also applies to all of your metaverse offerings — testing and making improvements are critical for successfulengagementwithany emerging technology.

UnlocktheMetaverse’s Value

The metaverse presents a significant opportunity, but many brands are wondering if customers are ready and willing to engage with them in this new space. Before you enter this market, consider how you can help customers easily access your brand in the metaverse. And with data privacy concerns continuing to rise, transparency around how you collect and use dataismoreimportantthanever. At the end of the day, the metaverseisstillverynew—you need to test your engagement strategiesandlearnandimprove as you go. Taking the time to understand how to best engage consumers in the metaverse will enableyoutounlockitsfullvalue and encourage long-lasting customer loyalty.

BoostingyourBusinessUsingVisualsThatResonatewithyourAudience

By Matias Colotuzzo

HOWIMPORTANTAREVISUALStoabusiness and its brand reputation? How important is it to pick the right visuals for your business and your intended tone and messaging?

The short answer: very important. But first, let’s take a little deeper dive into why.

Anecdotally, I think anyone can remember an occasion whereourfirstimpressionof abusiness/ brand was established by something we saw. Whether that was an advertisement on TV, a storefront display you walked by, or countless other examples.

That impression often lasts and is the first thing that comes to mind when someone references that brand. This underscores the importance of selectingtherightvisualstoalign withyourbrand.

Scientifically, this idea that visuals used by businesses tend to leave the longest lasting and most impactful impression can be explained through a couple of key data points.

Research shows that 90% of information transmitted to our brains is visual, and further tothispoint,ourbrainsactuallyprocessvisuals 60,000times fasterthantext.

Visuals hold immense marketing value to businesses of all sizes and industries. But how can those brands ensure their chosen visuals boost their interaction with the right messaging and tone?

Howtoboostyourbusiness usingvisuals

As businesses look to leverage visuals to grow thebusiness,theymustensureanyandallvisuals they employ serve four essential purposes: • help your business stand out from the crowd,

• be in line with your intended messaging, • resonates with your intended audience, and finally, • align with thecurrent trends of the day, when possible.

First,itisabsolutelyessentialthatanymessaging used in your visuals — whether it is actual text-

based messaging or more rooted in visual implications — is in line with the message you intend to send to consumers and the overall tone and message of your brand.

Yes, picking the flashiest and most attention-grabbing visuals can definitely get the attention of many consumers. But what’s the point if those visuals draw consumers in without actually communicating your brand’s intended messaging?

Not only could you be wasting your marketing budget, but it could have a pretty profound impact on the overall brand image of your business. Marketing industry research shows 71% of companies agree that inconsistent brand presentation often leads to customer confusion, damaging brand reputation and image.

With your mesaging finely tuned and tailored to your brand and its intended brand image, the next area you will want to address is picking visualstohelpyourbusinessstandoutfromyour competitors.

Selecting attention-grabbing and visually stimulating visuals will guarantee a long-lasting impression in the minds of the consumers you wish to attract.

ReinforceYourBrandImage

Beyond simply picking the visuals that stand out the most — which is essential — you can also use this as an opportunity to reinforce your brand’s image and message through a visual component, like a signaturecolorscheme.

If you do not already have a signature brand color, establishing one is powerfully recommended, as research showsthatleveragingasignature color scheme can increase your brand recognition by 80%.

The last two critical aspects of boosting your business with visuals — ensuring you are resonatingwiththerightaudience and leveraging any trends of the day when possible — are pretty closely tied together, at least in terms of a technological solution.

But let’s first touch on the importance of these two aspects beforewediveintothetechnologyavailabletoday that directly addresses these critical issues in a way that could change your brand’s marketing efforts now and far into the future.

Attractingtherightaudiencewiththe trends oftoday

First, you must ensure your visuals resonate with the right audience. Yes, you can have attention-grabbing visuals tailored to precisely the

messaging your business wants to communicate. Still, if the visuals you chose do not resonate with the rightaudience, all those effortsare fornaught.

In the past, ensuring your visuals resonate with the right audience would require a dedicated market research team, which is often expensive, time-consuming, and simply not feasible for businesses ofa smaller size.

Quite similarly, for businesses aiming to align theirmarketingeffortswiththemostcurrenttrends — visual or otherwise — the old school methods ofengagingwiththepublicandconductingmarket research are quickly becoming outdated and becoming too expensive and time-consuming for businesses ofall sizes.

UsingModernSolutions

So what modern solutions to this problem exist for today’s businesses at an affordable price and withtheflexibilityandscalabilityneededintoday’s businesslandscape?

Today,technologiesareavailabletoshortcutthis process and revolutionize how businesses stay in tune with their preferred consumer audience and thetrendsthatwillresonatewiththeconsumersof the day,which we willdive into shortly.

Leveragingtechnologytoresonatewithyour audience

As mentioned, ensuring their visuals resonate with the right audience is two of the biggest challengesforthoselookingtoboosttheirbusiness. The other is ensuring those visuals leverage the trends consumers are paying attention to.

These issues have challenged businesses and their visual design teams for decades. The consequencesofnotaligningvisualswiththeright audience or trends — whether visuals on your actual products or visuals used in your marketing campaigns — can be immense.

Failing to align with these critical aspects could leave you with large amounts of inventory that

BusinessVisuals from page 101

consumers have no interest in, or even worse, having dumped your entire marketing budget into a campaign whose visuals are not resonating with the right consumers and leaving you with no budgetleftovertopivotyourvisualsforarenewed marketing effort.

KeepYourBusinessinTuneWithitsIntended Audience

In the past, without the technologies available today, attempting to keep your business in tune with its intended audience while using the current trends of the day was a burdensome, timeconsuming,and expensive task.

For businesses who could afford it, these efforts mostoften fell into hiring a marketresearch team. Still, this strategy is not viable for companies of all sizes, as the costs associated with employing a market research team can be pretty significant and untenable for smaller businesses.

KeepYourBusinessinTuneWithCurrent Trends

For other businesses with less available capital, stayingintouchwiththeiraudienceandthetrends of the day requires the business owner and their staff to remain personally immersed in the market and its trends; looking to engage with existing customers to ensure their needs are being met or meeting potential new customers at industry events to get a sense of what your intended audience is looking for from your brand.

For one thing, the latter strategylacks accuracy, and both of these strategies lack the agility, flexibility, and scalability required by many businesses in today’s modernlandscape.

So how can these businesses leverage technology to shortcutthese processes?

Scalableandaffordabledata-drivendesign engines

Intoday’smodernage,technologyplaysacrucial roleinhelpingbusinessesensuretheirvisualsare alignedwiththeir intendedaudience and the most recent trends.

One key area of technology that isripe to be leveraged by today’s brands as they look to boost

their business withvisuals is the modern and innovative data-driven design engines available on the market.

UsetheRightData-DrivenDesignEngine

The right data-driven design engine (try Vexels. com) — powered by the analysis of your target audience through various aspects like global trends,searchtrends,downloadtransactions,and

subscriber requests — will allow businesses to leverage increased visibility and insight into their marketanditstrendstoenablethemtopinpointthe exactvisualsthatwillresonate with theiraudience and succeed at aligning with the trends of today.

Notonlydoestherightdata-drivendesignengine trulyguaranteeyourbusinessisleveragingtheright visuals for its products, services, and marketing efforts,butitalsodoessowhileprovidingsignificant savings in terms of both budget spent and hours allocated and the scalability and flexibility needed in today’sbusiness landscape.

Conclusion

With today’s technology available to them, businessesofalltypesandsizescanleveragethe powerofvisualsto boosttheir businesswithmore impactthan ever before.

https://readwrite.com/boosting-your-business-usingvisuals-that-resonate-with-your-audience/ Image credit: Photo by RODNAE Productions; Pexels, vexels.com, hbculifestyle.com, oasdom.com

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MIT Scientists Have Developed a new Kind of Camera — from a Crab

By Elissaveta M. Brandon

FORDECADES,traditionalcamerasworkedvery muchlikethehumaneye:thecorneaservedasthe lenscover,theirisand pupilbecametheaperture, and the lens became, well, the camera lens. But humanvisionhasitslimits,so the next generation of camera makers may have to look a little further for inspiration.

Scientists have developed an artificial eye inspired by the fiddler crab (the crab with the single huge claw). Compared to a pair of human eyes, which together can see about 180 degrees, the fiddler crab has an almost 360-degree field of view. It also can see on both land and water. When translated into a machine, this could mean more versatile cameras for self-driving cars and drones, both of which can become untrustworthy in therain.

The vision system was recently published in the journal Nature Electronics and developed by a team of researchers from MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, the Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology, and the Seoul National University in Korea.

Designers look to nature for inspiration frequently: From furry moths to krill to elephants, animals have inspired design innovations like acoustic wallpaper, energy-saving windows, and cooler building facades.And while nature-inspired cameras aren’t a new innovation either (in 2020, a fish eye inspired another wide field-of-view camera), amphibian solutions have been hard to comeby.

Here, scientists took to the fiddler crab because ofitscompoundeye.Unlikethehumaneye,which canonlylookinonedirectionatatime,compound eyes are akin to having lots of little eyes looking in different directions at the same time (a useful weapon when you’re a crab trying to survive on wide open tidal beaches). Many insects have compound eyes, but Gil Ju Lee, one of the study authors, explains that what makes fiddler crabs so special is they can see both on land and underwater. The key lies in the flat surface of the microlenses that make up the crab’s eye, which maintain their focal length, and thereby their focus, regardless of how water scatters lightthroughthelens.

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The artificial eye, which resembles a little black ball, works much like the fiddler crab’s eye: it too uses a flat lens to refract natural light in way that worksaboveandbelowwater,alongwithanarrayof photodiodesthatmimicthecrab’sphotoreceptors. For now, it has a very low resolution of 256 pixels (compared to 12 million pixels in an iPhone 13 camera), and it takes about 30 minutes to take a photograph. But at 2 centimeters and only a few grams, it’s compact, lightweight, and uses little power.

In other words, if the scientists manage to improve the resolution, drone deliveries and self-driving cars could get a lot more efficient

credit:

YouTube in Challenge to TikTok to Give Shorts Creators 45% of Ad Sales

By Dawn Chmielewski and Paresh Dave

YOUTUBE UNVEILED a new way for creators to make money on short-form video, as it faces intensifying competition from TikTok.

The Google-owned (GOOGL.O) streaming service announcedrecentlythatitwould introduce advertising on its video feature Shorts and give video creators 45% of the revenue. That compares with its standard distribution of 55% for videos outside of Shorts, and TikTok's $1 billion fund for paying creators.

Hairstylist-turned-YouTubecreator Kris Collins, who goes by Kallmekris, lauded YouTube for offering revenue-sharing for Shorts.

"Other platforms are focused on getting people their 15 secondsoffame,whichisgreat," she said."ButYouTube istaking a different approach. They're helping creators make stuff in multipleformats."

The internet's dominant video site has struggled to compete with TikTok, the app that got its start hosting lip-sync and dance

videos and has subsequently burgeoned to 1 billion monthly users.

YouTube responded in late 2020 with Shorts, minute-long videos that attract more than 1.5 billionmonthlyviewers.

In April, YouTube created a $100 million fund to entice creators to make the bite-sized videos in its bid to hang onto talent.The new revenue-sharing plan, first reported by the New York Times, is meant to be a bigger and more sustainable lurethanthefundandsomething TikTok has yettomatch.

YouTube is sharing a smaller proportion of sales with Shorts creators to offset its significant investment in developing the

feature, Vice President Tara WalpertLevy said.

Googlegenerated$14.2billion in YouTube ad sales during the first half of this year, up 9% from the same period in2021.

But the most recent quarterly ad sales reflected the slowest growth since disclosure of that data began three years ago. Though global economic factors are at play, financial analysts havesaidTikTokalsoisafactor..

https://www.reuters.com/ technology/youtube-challengetiktok-give-shorts-creators-45ad-sales-2022-09-20/

Image credit: marinelifeofmumbai.in

Technology/Science USTDA Commits to Internet Access Project in the DRC

THE U.S.Trade and DevelopmentAgency awarded a grant to Global Broadband Solution SARL (GBS), an internet service provider based in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), for a feasibility study to expand rural internet connectivity for half a million people in the DRC’s eastern region. GBS selected California-basedstartupUkama, Inc. (Ukama) to carry out the study, which includes a pilot project to demonstrate the delivery of Ukama’s connectivity technology.

“USTDA is committed to expanding rural internet access across Africa, working in partnership with the continent’s private and public sectors,” said Enoh T. Ebong, USTDA’s Director. “Under our Access Africa initiative, we are supporting connectivity for millions of Africans by tapping intotheexpertiseofU.S.industry, whose innovative solutions are trusted and second to none.”

USTDA’s pilot project and feasibility study will advance GBS’s goal of connecting individuals and businesses to affordable high-speed internet networks in the DRC’s North Kivu and South Kivu Provinces. The study will assess the economic and technical viability

of deploying an end-toend LTE connectivity solution for data services delivered over satellite and fixed wireless technology using Ukama’s decentralized cellular internet infrastructure.

“This study will help prove the decentralized cellular internet networktechnologyandbusiness model to get cellular internet connectivity to the people of the DRC,” said Zubeir Mohamed, GBS’s Chief Technology Officer. “We are excited to work with USTDA on this opportunity to test and deploy technology to help further our vision of providing reliable cost-effective data access for individuals and businesses alike”

Kashif Ali, founder and CEO of Ukama, said: “The USTDAfunded study will bring together local stakeholders, as well as leading access and backhaul technology and financial institutions. We aim to provide affordable access to the internet using decentralized cellular internet networks in the Eastern DRC, which can be replicated to other parts of the DRC and rural Africa.”

This activity supports the goals of USTDA’s Access

Africa initiative to advance the deployment of critical ICT infrastructure in communities across the continent. It also advances the objectives of the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment, aswellastheU.S.government’s ProsperAfricainitiativedesigned to increase two-way trade and investment between the United States and Africa. Since 1992, USTDA has funded more than 80 activities in sub-Saharan Africa’s ICTsector.

The U.S. Trade and Development Agency helps companies create U.S. jobs through the export of U.S. goods and services for priority infrastructure projects in emerging economies. USTDA links U.S. businesses to export opportunities by funding project preparation and partnership building activities that develop sustainable infrastructure and foster economic growth in partner countries.

MEDIAINQUIRIES:PaulMarin | 1-703-875-4357. https://ustda.gov/ustda-commits-tointernet-access-project-in-the-drc/

Small Nuclear Reactors Finally Get the Nod from Regulators

By Mark Sullivan and Alex Pasternack Edited: Dawn Team

THEUSNuclearRegulatoryCommission,made its news in August when it gave final certification to a new kind of nuclear reactor called a small modularreactor(SMR).Whiletheannouncement received basically no fanfare, proponents say it could play an important role in decarbonizing the world’s energy supply.

The agency first performed a safety review of reactorcompanyNuScalePower’sSMRdesign in 2020.Ayearlater,theNRCcompleteditsstandard rulemaking process, which included a review of public comments. On August 2, the commission issued a final approval for the SMR, though NuScale says it’s unlikely to become operational until2029.

Technically, nuclear power is capable of delivering large amounts of emissions-free

power. In fact, with 93 commercial nuclear plants around the country, nuclear fission already produces about 55% of all carbon-free power in the U.S., and yet it constitutes only about 19% of the country’soverall power supply.(See below for amap of the US’snuclear plants.) Fossilfuels still account for an astounding 63%.

And nuclear contribution to the overall energy sector is diminishing, due to safety concerns and high costs, especially compared with declining prices in solar and wind. The Energy Information Administration has projected that the share of all electricity generated from nuclear power in the U.S. will decline from 20% today to just 12% by 2050. Disasters at large gigawatt-scale plants, including Three Mile Island (1979), Chernobyl (1986), and Fukushima Daiichi (2011) continue to fuelpublicmisgivingsabout nuclear power. Explosions at Europe’s largest nuclear plant—in the Ukrainian

Alight water small modular nuclear reactor

based

Department

city of Enerhodar, currently occupied by Russian forces—prompted renewed fears that Russian rockets could unleash anuclear catastrophe.

But over the past two years, nuclear has been gettingaserioussecondlookfrommanypeoplein thescientificandpolicycommunities.Theybelieve a new generation of reactors, including smaller andsaferones,couldremaketheimageofnuclear powerandclearthewayforthetechnologytoplay abigger role inachieving a carbon-free future.

“I am cautious to say those five dangerous words:Somethingisdifferentthistime.ButItfeels like a zeitgeist is changing with growing public support and positive regulatory attention,” says Josh Wolfe, a partner at the science-focused VC Lux Capital. “If we really want to reshape and greenourenergysupply,the singlesmartestthing to do is build more of the elemental energy plants (formerly known as nuclear) we already have producing clean, zero-carbon electricity.”

ASLOWMARCHTOWARDANUCLEAR FUTURE

Risingtemperatures,risingfuelprices,andrising demands for energy independence have recently prompted some to reconsider their nuclear retreats. South Korea is resuming construction on two reactors, Japan plans to restart four reactors this year, and Germany is considering

extending the life of three formerly left-for-dead plants. In California, Governor Gavin Newsom is reconsidering his decision to close the state’s last nuclear plant, which provides 9% of the state’s electricity.

Likemostoftheworld’sreactors,thesearehuge, complex, and based on decades-old designs. Yet smaller, modular nuclear reactors have been the subjectofspeculationandresearchformanyyears. They fit into the category of “advanced nuclear” powertechnology,whichtheDepartmentofEnergy has identified as a key tool for decarbonizing the country’s energy supply.

While traditional nuclear power plants are built on-site, SMRs can be built in a factory and shipped to a facility for deployment. They use smaller amounts of radioactive material, which makes them easier to cool and secure—and lessens the potential damage of a leak.

Incontrasttocurrentgigawatt-scalereactors,the DOE defines SMRs as reactors that can produce upto300megawatts.NuScale’spressurizedwater reactors, which look like oblong tubes and are 65 feet tall and 15 feet in diameter, can generate about 77 megawatts of electricity each. (For reference, an energy industry rule of thumb is that 1megawattisenoughtopower1,000households, althoughthisvarieswidelyamonghomesincolder and warmer parts of the country.)

An energy producer can seat up to 12 of the NuScale reactors together at one site, for example, to produce up to 924 megawatts of power. The reactors sit together in an underground cooling pool. In the event of power failure, the reactors automatically shut down and self-cool. This passive, operatorfreesafetyapproachisalreadyinuseinsome conventional reactors, as well as in dozens of proposed SMR designs, from thermalneutron and fast-neutron to molten salt and gas-cooled reactors.

In its first commercial deployment, NuScale is licensing its reactor design to Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems, which intends to build a six-reactor plant. NuScale has yet to make a profit, but in the last year its revenue grew by 397%, and a

recent tweet claimed it has “18 signed and active MOUs with potential customers in 11 countries.”

NuScale’s is the seventh reactor design and the first SMR to be approved by the Nuclear RegulatoryCommission,althoughtheagencyisin theearlystagesofreviewingotherSMRconcepts.

(The Tennessee Valley Authority is preparing to apply to the NRC for initial certification of a new SMRbyGE-Hitachionthesiteofanoldcoalplant nearOakRidge.)Gettingapprovalisapainstaking process. According to NuScale, it involved more thanaquartermillionreviewhours,“about2million pagesofdocumentationmadeavailableforreview or audit,and about 100 gigabytes of testdata.”

So far, only one reactor design, Westinghouse’s AP1000,aconventionalpressurizedwaterreactor, has progressed to construction in the U.S., with two now being built at the Vogtle plant in Georgia. After long delays and cost overruns (construction was originally planned to conclude in 2017, and the cost has ballooned to more than $30 billion) the Vogtle plant recently received approval from the NRC to start fuel loading and head toward operation.

As with any new nuclear project, further cost overruns—oroneaccident—couldsettheindustry back even further. Proponents of SMRs are banking on catapulting theindustryforward.

SMRS’CONTESTEDROLEIN DECARBONIZATION

While the nuclear industry has gotten behind SMRs,andcompanieslikeNuScalehaveattracted considerableinvestment,thetechnologystillfaces skepticism.

“It’s a solution in search of a problem,” says Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists. “[The nuclear industry] is looking around for something new to show that it’s not just going to try the same old things,but its options are fairlylimited.”

Lymansaysthe economicsofSMRsdon’tmake sense. “If you shrink down the reactors, it goes against the economies of scale that you get with larger reactors.”

Asaresult,Lymanpredicts,energyproviderswill beforcedtofindwaystolowerthecostofoperating

SMRs in order to sell the power generated at a competitiveprice.That wouldintroducesignificant safetyandsecurityconcernsbecausetheymaytry to spend less on safety systems and on securing the facilities.

Or,thenuclearindustrymightarguethatbecause SMRsuselessradioactivematerialandareeasier tocool,it’ssafetolocatethemnearertopopulation centers. (Indeed, the Montana Legislature, as well as West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, have proposedputtingtheminretiredcoalplants).Even worse, Lynan fears, operators could cut corners on safety guidelines, dispensing with evacuation plans that might be needed in emergencies.

NuScale says that because its reactors can be madeinafactorysettingusing“offtheshelf”items, plant operators avoid the high cost of fabricating custom parts on-site. In addition, NuScale says, its SMRs save money because if power demand increases, an operator can simply add more reactors to the plant instead of shouldering the major capital expenseofbuilding new reactors and structures.

THEPROBLEM THATWON’TGO AWAY

Along with economic challenges, one central question for any nuclear project is location—both where to install reactors and where to bury their waste. SMRs have been billed as small enough to fit behind someone’s house, but historic fears of nuclear energy will likely continue to keep reactors out of the backyards of all but the poorest communities. And after decades, the waste question continues to plague the industry.And waste adds to the risk ofproliferation.

Nuclear Reactorsin the USA

Someargue thatSMRscouldmaketheproblem worse.InapapercoauthoredbyAllisonMacfarlane, formerchairpersonoftheNRC,andpublishedlast

monthintheProceedingsoftheNationalAcademy of Sciences, an analysis of three SMR designs— from NuScale, Terrestrial Energy, and Toshiba— concluded that SMRs will generate more nuclear waste than a standard pressurized water reactor bya factor of anywherefrom 2to 30.

NuScale and other proponents of SMRs balked at the study. “The paper uses outdated design informationfortheenergycapacityoftheNuScale fueldesignandwrongassumptionsforthematerial used in the reactor reflector, and on burn-up of the fuel,” Diane Hughes, VP of marketing and communications for NuScale, said in a statement to FastCompany.

“With the correct inputs,” she said, “NuScale’s design compares favorably with current large pressurized water reactors on spent fuel waste createdperunitofenergy.Theseinputsarepublicly availabletothepaper’sauthors,andtheiromission undermines the credibility of the paper and its conclusions.” (In response, the paper’s authors contended they based their analysisontheonly publicly available reactor designs at the time.)

Hughes added: “NuScale’s design does not create waste and material streams that are noveltothenuclear power industry.”

Comparedtotheir Russian and Chinese counterparts, “advanced nuclear” companies in the U.S. like NuScale face relatively greater regulatory and financial hardship.The Russian and Chinese governments use a lighter regulatory touch for new nuclear technologyandaremoreforthcomingwithfunding grants.Thus, those countries have taken the lead in SMR deployment.

Akademik Lomonosov, a floating nuclear power plant in Russia’s Far East, was as of May 2020 theworld’sfirstandonlyoperatingprototypeSMR.

In July 2021, construction began on the world’s first commercial land-based SMR at the Chinese power plant Linglong One, where a prototype is due to startoperation by the end of 2026.

Policymakers in the U.S. are of course aware of this and have begun taking steps to bolster the country’s nuclear industry. Last year’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law included $6 billion for a Civil Nuclear Credit Program to support plants at risk of economic closure. And the Inflation Relief Act recently passed by the Senate contains billions in energy-related subsidies, including some that could impactSMRsspecifically.

In addition to $60 billion for renewable energy like wind, solar, and hydro, the act includes $700 millionfordomesticminingandproductionofhighassay,low-enricheduraniumanda6%taxcreditfor energy providers investing in “advanced nuclear” technologies.For technology inthe “microreactor” class (SMRs) the investment credit can go up to 30%.

The provisions are part of the more $250 billion that the bill would devote to combating climate change,withtheaimofreducingU.S.greenhouse gas emissions by an estimated 40% below 2005 levelsby 2030.

“Bycreatingtaxincentivesthatincludeallcarbonfree technologies, we are one step closer to deploying new, cutting-edge nuclear technologies that will meet the growing demand for more clean energy,” Maria Korsnick, president and chief executive officer at the Nuclear Energy Institute, said in a statement. “The climate provisions in the IRAadvance us on a path to decarbonize our economy.Andnuclearenergy,alongsidewindand solar, will be critical to achieving thisgoal.”

Obviously, the tax credits won’t de-risk investments in new kinds of nuclear reactors like SMRs. But by improving the economics of their development and deployment, the government may help new nuclear technology play a larger partinthemixofcleanenergysourcesthatwillbe needed to wind down our increasingly dangerous dependence on dirty fuels..

https://www.fastcompany.com/90777719/new-nuclearreactors-finally-get-regulators-nod-but-they-still-have-a-lotof-proving-to-do

Image credit: power-eng.com, mapcruzin.com

The Metaverse and the Future of Creativity— What it Means for Creators

By Brooke Hopper for Adobe

IN ITS EARLY STAGES, the metaverse has shownbenefitsforcreators,rangingfromtheability dowhattheyloveandmakemoneyinnewways,to seamless collaboration and more.

Yetbecause of itsunknowns, the metaversecan also be intimidating to artists. As someone who is building creative tools for this yet-to-be-fullyexplored metaverse, my hope is that it can be a homeforallcreatives,wheretheyeasilyadaptand understandhowthemetaversecanserveasatool to achieve their goals.

As Web 3.0 and the metaverse continues to evolve,therearesomeprimarybenefitstocreativity in this new space. 1.Collaborationandconnectivitywilldrive creativestogodigital.

At the heart of the metaverse is social connection, which is driving many to this digital realm. For creatives, connectivity goes hand-inhand with collaboration, and I believe the digital canvaswillbecomebothdimensionalandsocialas creatives work better and faster together, remixing each other’s work.

Professional photographer and creative Jeremy Cowart sums up how collaboration and connectivity in the metaverse will allow for more opportunitiesfor creatives,noting,“I’m doingmore collaborations than I ever have in my entire life/ career. I’m also more connected to other artists than I’ve ever been. I think we all realize that this Web 3.0 space is brand-new and kind of hanging onbyathread.So,weallneedeachother,andwe need each other to win. A rising tide truly lifts all boats in this new industry.”

Imagine having one piece create an entire world or even a series of worlds—we see it often now in physical fandoms. An author writes a book, which then inspires fan art, which gets the eyes

of producers who make a movie, which captures the hearts of children who handmake Halloween costumes, who then raise kids to read the original books, and so on. Inthemetaverse,all of this can live in one collaborative, digital place where creatives can express their relative art to those that can remix it as many times as they want, seamlessly transitioning between artist and consumer.

As everything becomes a canvas, creatives will facenewlearningcurvesnavigatinghowtomerge the physical and digital worlds together, which brings me to my next point.

2.The linesbetween 2Dand3Dartworkwill becomeblurred.

Manycreativesfaceasteeplearningcurvewhen navigating 3D art creation, especially traditionally 2D artists attempting the move to create 3D work in a digital space. Adding to the challenges they face,thesecreativesareusuallyshortontimeand budget due to strict freelance timelines or side hustles. To be successful in this immersive realm, creatives need to learn how to leverage 3D technologythatcandotheworkforthem.With existing technology that detects form and shape, creativescancreateinadimensiontheyknowand automatically have their work rendered in 3D.

Take for instance the recent, popular Van Gogh immersive exhibits. Being able to see each brush stroke of “The Starry Night” larger than life on a projector screen brought new meaning to the

Adobe:ArtistBenjamin Kohl –Created in Adobe Fresco

piece.Now,imagineanentireworldlikethiswhere youcandiveintothelayersofapieceand,keeping accessibility in mind, be able to touch the bumps in the canvas; hear the brush strokes and crickets chirp; see beyond the canvas into the actual landscapeVanGoghsaw.3Dactivationscanbring artto lifebeyond our wildest dreams.

Further, in the metaverse, recontextualizing content will become the norm, where avatars (electronic images commonly used online) will be used to represent people. Avatars will become part of the whole—acting both as a standalone piece as a sign of the times, and simultaneously a glimpse at your broader, all-encompassing online masterpiece. Identity will play a key role in how people experience the metaverse. With new options to decorate personal VR spaces, avatars, and more, there will be an increased need to generate content for these experiences and allow users to build unique digital identities.

3.Creatives willenjoytotalfreedomtocreate.

Artists who have previously had to worry about

copyright laws and protecting their work will be free to create without fear of their work being stolen or shared without attribution with the unconditional rules of sharing art in the metaverse. Systems and marketplaces in the metaverse will allow easy transfer of rights through attribution models and make sure those who created it are getting properly compensated.

WHAT’SNEXTFORCREATIVITYIN THEMETAVERSE?

Asthemetaversecontinuestodevelop, creatives can apply learnings from building the original world wide web and tap into all the benefits this digital realm offers that the physical realm doesn’t. Many creatives are scared to enter this unknownspaceandareunsureofwhat’s to come, which is why I encourage them to take control of their creative future. Obstacles are unavoidable and artists will always face new challenges, especially when entering a new creative realm, but I’m hoping more creatives will feel empowered to take advantage of what the metaverse has to offer.

The metaverse will bring collaboration, identity, and creativity to new heights all while preserving and enhancing the romanticism and realism of physical art. Jeremy’s sentiment on the future of creativity in the metaverse accurately portrayswhatmanyofusarefeeling:“It’schanging everyday.I’veneverbeenapartofanindustrythat moves so fast. But I’ve also never had more fun. It’s the wild,wild west,andanything goes.”

I believe it’s safe to say the metaverse is defining—and disrupting—the future of creativity, and I’m excited to support creatives in not only adapting to this new platform but learning to thrive init.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90767915/themetaverse-and-the-future-of-creativity-what-itmeans-for-creators

Image credit: https://www.facebook.com/ virgensantabarbarabendita, https://metaversetours.com/ feb-14-2015-metaverse-tour, https://www.bizcommunity. com/Article/196/484/220826.html

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Thousands Gather to Fete South Africa’s new Zulu King from Aljazeera

THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE gatheredattheZulu royalpalaceinSouthAfricaonAugust20thforthe coronation of a new king in the country’s richest and mostinfluential traditional monarchy.

Misuzulu Zulu, 47, is set to succeed his father, Goodwill Zwelithini, who died in March last year after 50 years in charge, but a bitter succession dispute threatened to overshadow the ceremony.

Although the title of king does not bestow executive power, the monarchs wield great moral influence over more than 11 million Zulus, who make up nearly one-fifth of South Africa’s population.

Men and women in traditional outfits assembled onSaturdayoutsidethemarblepalaceonthehills of Nongoma, a small town in the southeastern province of KwaZulu-Natal,the Zuluheartland.

Tensofthousandsmorewereexpected toarrive to honour the new sovereign.

“Today, the king will be acknowledged by the wholeZuluNation,”saidMisuzulu’ssister,Princess Ntandoyesizwe Zulu, 46.

Coronation rites

In Nongoma, lines of Zulu warriors, known as Amabuthos and holding spears and shields of animal skin, marched into thepalace grounds.

Women – in pleated skirts and beaded belts or draped with fabrics bearing the effigy of the sovereign– sang and danced.

On Friday night, Misuzulu entered the palace’s “cattle kraal” where he took part in a secret rite designed to present the new monarch to his ancestors.

Only select members of the royal family and Amabuthos were allowed in the enclosure which is protected from curious eyes by a thick fence of tree trunks.

“It’s a holy place, we can’t reveal to the world what is happening there,” said Muntomuhle Mcambi, 34,an amaButho.

Earlier this week, the soon-to-be king also killed alionatanearbyreserve–inoneofthelaststeps beforethe coronation.

Family spat

Hispathtothecrownhasnotbeensmooth.King Zwelithini left six wives and at least 28 children when he died lastyear.

Misuzulu is the first son of Zwelithini’s third wife, who he designated as regent in his will. But the queen died suddenly a month later, leaving a will namingMisuzuluasthenextking–adevelopment that did not go down well with other branches of the family.

“Those who are Zulu and know the traditions know who is the king,” said Themba Fakazi, an adviser to the previous ruler who supports Misuzulu.

The next Zulu monarch will inherit a fortune and tapintoarichseam ofincome.Zwelithinireceived some 71 million rand ($4.2m) a year from the government and owned several palaces and other properties.

A royal trust manages almost three million hectares (7.4 million acres) of land – an area about the sizeof Belgium.

President Cyril Ramaphosa, who in March recognised Misuzulu as the rightful king, is to formallycertifythecrowningataceremonyinthe coming months.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/8/20/ thousands-gather-to-fete-south-africas-new-zuluking

Image credit: baynews9.com, lakecountystar.com, elegikobam.blogspot.com

on

People King

By Alexander Onukwue

THE DISCOURSE AMONG

Africans following the death of Queen Elizabeth II became feisty as her reign ended on September7th.Inoneofthefirst signs: Twitter, where her death was first officially announced, deleted a post by Nigerian professor Uju Anya who, reactingtonewsofthemonarch’s health, wished that her dying pain “beexcruciating.”

For some,Twitter’s swift move (which the company indicated was based on a violation of its rules) negated the free speech principles it is supposed to uphold. In the opposing camp, Jeff Bezos was taken aback by Anya’s tweet. Carnegie Mellon University, where the professor teaches linguistics, said her “offensive and objectionable” views did not reflect its values. Immediate condemnations of the tweet betray a lack of historical insight into the Britishempire’sbloodylegacy onthecontinent.

The episode teases the tone ofthepostmortemofthe second Elizabethan age which oversaw thelast16yearsofforcedBritish rule in Africa. In the decades since,alotofefforthasgoneinto moving past the uncomfortable

historythroughaid,development

finance, and organs of the Commonwealth of Nations to createacordialfutureostensibly basedoncooperationnotcontrol. Official condolences—from the president of Ghana, incoming president of Kenya, and the NigerianbossoftheWorldTrade Organization—conveyed that sentiment.

Still, it is not surprising that, if stripped of its supposed acidity, Anya’scentralsubmission that she will not honor the person “whosupervisedagovernment that sponsored the genocide that massacred and displaced half my family”—mirrors other strongly-held views informed by past events.

Elizabeth II was visible in a plunderedAfrica

After her first visit to Kenya in February 1952 as the heir to the British throne, Elizabeth II became a frequent guest on the continent.

Thelastofhertwodozenorso trips was in 2007 to Uganda for the 20th Commonwealth Head ofGovernmentsMeeting. “Ithink I have seen more of Africa than almost anybody,” she says, to the amusement of a handful of interlocutors.

She took the pomp of the British monarchy wherever she went, eliciting the awe ofAfrican heads of state (military and democratic alike) who tended to pull out the stops to impress the embodiment of a 1,000year institution. Locals often seemed mesmerized by the grandeur. And perhaps all with good reason: the Queen had an estimated net worth exceeding half a billion dollars in personal assets. That’s before including the value of luxuryestates.

But while some of that wealth accrued from investments, it’s always been viewed with a lot of skepticism.

The punchy reactions to her death appear to stem from the fact she was the scion of a family that reaped returns from oppressed territories, and that she was a lifetime benefactor. One instance captures the sentiment: a now viral video of an aged woman describing the anguish of a Kenyan revolution brutally crushed by British

soldiersintheQueen’sfirstyear.

“Let Elizabeth bring what belongs to me,” she said. The video first appeared in June when the Queen celebrated her Platinum Jubilee.

Dead people don’t pay debts. It may render even the most vile Elizabethan tributes moot. Yet, as the crown passes to Charles III of the same family, thecombativeinquestsmaywell continue, this being a version of the central question: What does Britain owe Africa and

Queen Elizabeth IIwith

Rawlings of the

ofGhana, in

Black Twitter Responds

To The Death Of Queen Elizabeth

It Ain't

whenwillit payin full?

credit:

African Cuisine Made Mainstream: Roberta Brown Cooper’s Sumptuous Culinary Journey Across Regions

By Ruksana Hussain

HOW COULD A CONTINENT as large as Africa notbefeaturedincookbooksandbookstores?This question appeared multiple times during chef and author Roberta Brown Cooper’s 28-year career working in the travel industry as an international flight attendant with Pan American World Airways and American International Airways.

While she traversed the African continent and otherpartsoftheworld,curiousaboutcuisinesand cultures,itbecamecleartoherthatAfricancuisine, despiteitshealthyand nurturingreputation,simply wasn’t represented as much as other cuisines in mainstreammedia.

Thus, the idea was born for the cookbook “African Food is a Culinary Journey,” which Cooper released last January. The cookbook covering African culture, cuisine, history and heritage, featuring around 200 recipes from all regions of the continent, is truly a great addition to any family’s kitchen.

SpotlightingAfricanCuisine

“I'm excited about my cookbook. I'm getting positivefeedbackfromthosewhoboughtthebook and in helping to educate a lot of people about African cuisine,” Cooper says. The cookbook features recipes fromall regions of Africa and part of the proceeds from sales of the book will go to her nonprofit Marylanders for Progress (Liberia), Inc.raisingfundsforLiberia,whereshe’soriginally from.

“We'rebuildingwaterwellsforpoorcommunities, and we are building a school for a village that has never had a school building before,” she shares. The cookbook is the culmination of years of collecting recipes during Cooper’scareer in travel. Thatinspiredherloveforinternationalcuisinesand the desire to learn more about each country and regionshevisited.Therealizationsoonhitthatshe had never seen a cookbook that featured African

food in bookstores.

That began a quest to collect recipes every opportunity she got. Whether visiting friends during her travels or talking to passengers on planes, conversations revolved around food. Cooper’s mother also nudged her on to write a cookbook, hearing her concerns about not seeing any cookbooks on African food.

“African food is a culinary journey because it's a journey you're taking into the continent of Africa to learn what we eat, why we eat what we eat because our food is very healthy. It's all organic and natural, and the world needs to know that this is whatAfricanseat,” says Cooper.

“Most of the African food is steamed or grilled. Wedon'teatalotofsaltbecauseoftheherbs.You don't have people with diabetes or hypertension. We eat a lot of greens and grains. A lot of the foods that we eat also are connected to the food that African Americans eat in the United States,” Cooper shares

ImplementingCulinary Knowledge

The cookbook has about 200 recipes and represents every region of Africa. From West Africa,thereisjollof rice—a dishCoopersuggests is a must-try, especially given the fact that every country in Africa has its version of it. Another dish from West Africa is egusi soup, a renowned Nigerian dish.

From North Africa, there is the seven-vegetable couscous, a stew. Bamia (okra in Arabic) is a famous Egyptian dish made with tomatoes and garlic and eaten with bread or rice. From East Africa, there is coconut shrimp and a dish with spinach and peanuts.And thelist goes on.

The journey of bringing the cookbook to fruition also included attending culinary school. That’s where Cooper learned what would become the greatest hurdle in the process of writing her

recipes—measurements. “In Africa, when we cook, we just put things together. The outcome is always very delicious,” she says.

“But for me to be able to sell this book, I had to learn how to measure all the ingredients and that was a task,” admits Cooper. Her instructor at the prestigious L’Academie de Cuisine Culinary School in Gaithersburg, Maryland, warned that she would be the oldest in class and in a very challenging course. But she was prepared.“I said, ‘I'mexpectingthat,butI'mgoingtodoit,’andIwas determined to do it. I wanted to make sure I knew how food was prepared, how to cook different foodsfromdifferentpartsoftheworld,”sheshares.

Cooper never missed a day and graduated with honorsfromculinaryschool.Shehassinceworked withseveralnotablechefsincludingthelateWalter Scheib, former White House executive chef, and PatriceOlivon,formerexecutivechefattheFrench Embassy, Washington, D.C., chef instructor and programdirectorofCulinaryArtsatL’Academiede Cuisine.

HonoringChildhoodDreams

Cooper’s curiosity about the world around her began at a very young age. She knew there were three things she had her mind set on. She was interested in airplanes and wanted to be an air hostess, which was accomplished in 1972 when AmericanWorldAirwayscametoLiberiatorecruit flight attendants. She wanted to own a restaurant or be a caterer and was able to realize that during a stint where she did some catering for weddings, private parties,and the like.

She also wanted to be able to take over what

her mother was doing by becoming a humanitarian and supporting orphaned children like her—Cooper’s birth mother passed away during childbirth and she was adopted and raised by an American missionary. Her cause-oriented work in Liberia through her nonprofit organization stems from that wish.

Cooper lasttraveled to Africa at the beginning of 2020, just before the pandemic was announced, visiting Liberia, Ghana, Ivory Coast and Senegal. She hopes to revisit before the end of the year to view the work her nonprofit is doing in Maryland County, Liberia. She is hoping to replicate the elementaryschoolmodelinothervillagessomore young children can have access to the benefits of elementary education.

Meanwhile, Cooper’s focus is on spreading the word about the cookbook and bringing more exposure to African cuisine, no matter which region of the continent you turn to. It gives her great pleasure to watch others enjoy her creations andlearnmoreaboutthegastronomicdelightsthe continent offers.

“My book really does represent Africa, and I alwayssayit'saculinaryjourneyintothecontinent of Africa,” she says. “That was my goal, my vision, my dream, to introduce theworld to African food.”

To purchase the book and learn more about Cooper, visit www.africanfoodis.com or follow along forupdates on Instagram and Facebook.

https://www.cuisinenoirmag.com/african-cuisineroberta-brown-cooper/

Image credit: flipboard.com

Pictured:Roberta Cooper Brown|

Photo credit: Gerald Brown

Pictured:Book cover for AfricanFood Is | Photo credit: Roberta Cooper Brown

Pritzker Prize Winning Architect Francis Kéré on

What the West Still gets Wrong About Africa

Nataliya Nedzhvetskaya suggests. Or worse, an Africa-centric exhibit could recall the treatment of indigenous Filipinos and Congolese as “living exhibits” atthe 1904 St.Louis World’s Fair.

Thankfully,thetaskofnavigatingtheassignment has largely been given to FrancisKéré,the astute Burkinabè architect who recently made history as the first African to win the Pritzker Architecture Prize which is considered as the field’s most prestigiousaccolade.

Kéré describes the job of representing Africa at the Triennale as both a privilege and a burden. Instead of publishing a heady manifesto, his tacticistoofferexamples.Throughaseriesof installations, Kéré shows off African ingenuity and slays some myths along the way.

HOW DOES THE WORLD seeAfrica in 2022?

At the Triennale Milano’s new exhibition, the continent is curiously framed as an “unknown” alongside mysteries of the deep space and the originof life.

Overthenextfewmonths,thecentury-oldItalian cultural institution is showcasing the work of 400 artists,designers,andarchitectsfrom40countries, in the hopes of becoming a kind of agora for creative thinkers around the world. “This plurality ofpointsofviewwillallowustoexpandourgazeto encompass what we do not yet know,” explained Stefano Boeri, Triennale Milano’s president. The Africanperspectiveisrepresentedvianational pavilions for Burkina Faso, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, the Democratic Republic of Congo, andRwanda

Representing a culture as a curiosity in an international exhibition is a tricky curatorial task. In the wrong hands, the show could deepen problematic expressions of Africanism—that queasy mix of “ignorance and appreciation” that’s akin to 19th century Orientalism, as sociologist

At the international gallery, for instance, he erected a small building to showcase the graceful, sustainably-built architecture that’s become his trademark in Burkina Faso. Kéré also designed a seating area at the Triennale’s cafe that evokes community gatherings around a big shady tree practicedthroughoutAfrica.

Kéré’s most ambitious installation is a 40ft tower at the Triennale’s entrance. The immersivestructurethatinvitesvisitorstokneel atonepoint,ismeanttoconveytheexhibition’s themeofnavigatingthe“Unknown,Unknowns” as well as showcase building techniques and materialsextant inAfrica.

We spoke to Kéré just before the exhibition’s July15opening.Thefollowingtranscripthasbeen lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

HowdoyoufeelaboutAfricabeingframedas an“unknown”inthisexhibition.Whatdoesthe world notknowaboutAfrica atthisjuncture?

Francis Kéré: Africa is the closest neighbor to Europe but if you follow the discussions, it’s very clear that the West is is still not in a position to

Francis Kéré

know what matters to young Africans. Instead of seeing it as a young, dynamic continent, Africa is still seen as a place that needs help. If you close your eyes to what matters to your neighbor, then you’llnever reallyknow them.

There’salsostillthetendencytotalkaboutAfrica asonecountry.Mostareevenunawareofthesize of the continent. It’s so immense and culturally diverse;it’sacontinentwithitsownvalues,history, and expectations on life.

How do you feel about being asked to an ambassador for an entire continent at this exhibition?

Kéré: BeingabletotalkaboutAfricaisaprivilege. I came from a very poor country and suddenly, through design, I have this kind of visibility. It’s wonderful but it’s also a little daunting. The best thing that I can do is to build on examples from Burkina Faso.

I want to highlight the idea that even through

people lead better, healthier lives is one of the main goals of architecture. I think about this no matter what projectI’m working on.

If I’m designing a chair, for example, I think about how I can do it so people who sit on it feel supportedandfeellike strongerindividuals,which I think will put them in the position of helping build astronger community.

What makes African architecture worth knowing?

Kéré: ThroughoutAfrica, groups of people have found a way to live in harmony with nature. If you look at the carbon footprint of this huge continent, it’s producing less than 5% of the world’s total emissions. Perhaps we can contribute [ideas] for the restof the world.

The structure “Yesterday’s Tomorrow” is about the importance of the past. Already we’re talking about [3D]printing complete buildings, but if we build from knowledge and experience using the conventions we have, we have a chance to really serve humanity. If we don’t take this into consideration, we will fail.

Congratulations on winning the Pritzker Prize.Has itchanged thingsforyou?

Kéré: This [award] is the best thing that can happen tosomeone. Itwillfor surechange mylife completely and the life of my office.

The Pritzker is a big recognition, but I see it moreasapushtogoforward,youknow.I’vebeen awardedcourage—Ifeelit,Iseeit.It’slikesaying, “Go, Francis. Do it. Don’t fear.” I feel I have so much energy than ever before.

people are fighting to make a living, they’re generally happy and enjoy life. What makes Western people happy isn’t always what Africans want. Big cars might make an American happy but in Burkina Faso, a good mango tree or a beautifully-designed house out of wood or even cement blocks may be more meaningful.

Linking happiness and architecture is intriguing. Is this something you aspire for in yourwork?

Kéré: For me, creating something that helps

Theheartisstrongandthemindisreadytoreally keep going. [We want] to use these opportunities to expand our architecture from small to big and reallytrytocarefor humanity.Keepcaring—that’s what we’re trying to do.

Caring is your calling. It even rhymes with yourlast name.

Kéré: Yeah, it does!That’smy name.

The post Pritzker Prize winning architect Francis Kéré on what the West stillgets wrong about Africa appeared first on Quartz https://dnyuz.com/2022/07/14/pritzker-prizewinning-architect-francis-kere-on-what-the-weststill-gets-wrong-about-africa/ Image credit: vanityfair.it

for Lavazza

For First Time ever, a Black Woman has won the Prestigious Nasher Prize for Sculpture

By TheGrio Staff

THE NASHER SCULPTURE CENTER created a special prize in 2015 to celebrate “a living artist who elevates the understanding of sculpture and its possibilities,” and a Black woman is receiving the honor for the firsttime.

According to The Washington Post, Senga Nengudi, 79, an acclaimed artist whose unique sculptures incorporate nylon pantyhose and other miscellaneous items and spans more than half a century, is the 2023 recipient of the Nasher Prize from the Dallas-based museum.

Nengudi’s work, which has ably addressed the feminist and Black arts movements, is renowned for defying expectations and elevating artistic expression to a new level. For example, she once hung “fabric spirits,” fashioned from flag material fromfireescapesinHarlem,torepresentwhatshe called the souls of the people she encountered there.

The most notable of her artistic transformations was a dedication to the female body made out of worn-out pantyhose, in places filled with sand. Nengudi claimed that the concept, collectively referredtoas“R.S.V.P.,”cametoherfollowingthe birth ofher first child.

“I was looking for material that kind of reflected thefemalebody,”shepreviouslytoldcuratorElissa Auther, according to The Post. “And then, finally, I found the pantyhose. Right after that, I went, ‘Wow,’ because the whole birthing experience — you’re expanding, and then all of a sudden, after it’s over, you’re contracting, and your body kind of goesbackintoshape.Ireallywantedtosomehow express that experience.”

Nengudi, a Chicago native, studied both dance and art at what is now UCLA. Her experience at the formerPasadenaArtInstitutionissaidtohave opened hereyes tothewaysinwhich the twocan

coexist. She also volunteered in artprograms at WattsTowers.

‘A Picture Gallery of the Soul’ features photos from more than 100 artists capturing Black life

Also Read:

‘A Picture Gallery of the Soul’ features photos from more than 100 artists capturing Black life Japanattractedherinthe1960s after she became fascinated by Gutai,aradicalJapaneseartstyle in which artists painted canvases with their feet while rolling around inmudhalf-naked.WhenNengudi resettled in Los Angeles, she established Studio Z, a Black art collective, and collaborated with fellowartistsDavidHammonsand Maren Hassinger.

Nasher director Jeremy Strick praisedNengudiforherinnovative collaborations, which frequently combine dance, performance art and her crafted sculpture. He also acknowledged her use of inexpensive materials in accessible locations and her engagement with social issues that remain relevant.

“In more recent years, the extraordinary creativity of the Black art community — which, in the ’70s and ’80s, was in many waysmarginalized—isnowbeing recognized,” said Strick, The Post reported. “And so she occupies a criticalplaceinthehistoryofBlack

▲ Senga Nengudi is making her the firstBlack YouTube.com/Nasher Sculpture

 The most notable referredto as “R.S.V.P.,” child. (Photo: Screenshot/YouTube.com/Nasher

the 2023 recipient of the prestigious Nasher Prize, Blackwoman to be awarded the honor. (Photo: Screenhot/ SculptureCenter)

of Nengudi’s workis her pantyhose segment, collectively “R.S.V.P.,” whichcame to her after she gave birth to her first Screenshot/YouTube.com/Nasher Sculpture Center)

artsbutalso of art, period.”

Strick maintained that Nengudi continues to convey a powerful message through her work at a time when many states, the majority of which are controlled by Republicans, are taking away a woman’srighttomakeherowndecisionsregarding her body.

For instance, the state of Texas, where the Nasher Sculpture Center is housed, has one of the nation’s strictest abortion bans in place and, based on a statement from Gov. Greg Abbott in June,itselectedofficialsarealsoproudadvocates for overturning Roe v. Wade.

“Atamomentwhentherightofwomentocontrol their bodies has been taken away, she’s an artist whoseexplorationoffemaleidentitythroughworks made with pantyhose speaks with great power and relevance,” Strick said of Nengudi, according toThe Post.

Although prominent institutions — such as the Philadelphia Museum of Art and New York’s MuseumofModernArt— havehonored Nengudi, she believes that in some respects, such acknowledgments are at odds with the essence ofher work.

“An artist’s supposed greatest desire is the makingofobjectsthatwilllastlifetimesforposterity after all,” she has said, according to The Post. “Thishasneverbeenapriorityforme.Mypurpose istocreatean experiencethatwillvibratewiththe connecting thread.”

The Colorado-based creator is set to receive $100,000 for winning the 2023 Nasher Prize, followed by programming devoted to her art, such as gallery exhibits and conversations, and a gala is scheduled inApril..

https://news.yahoo.com/first-time-ever-blackwoman-145500545.html

MARVEL FANS, GET READY for Kang the Conqueror.Thefamedcomicbookvillainistaking overtheMarvelCinematicUniverse(MCU),with Jonathan Majors playing the role in “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” and beyond.

As theGrio previously reported, Majors nabbed the role of Kang the Conqueror back in the fall of 2020. In the new Multiverse Saga of the MCU, Kangwillbe the overarching villain, similar to how Josh Brolin’sThanoswas the villain for the Infinity Saga (which lasted from 2008 to 2019). Majors made a brief appearance in the season finale of “Loki” on Disney+ as a “variant” version of the character, but is set to make his proper debut in the upcoming “Ant-Man” film.

While promoting the film at San Diego ComicCon last weekend, Kevin Feige, head of Marvel Studios, opened up about Majors’ being a part of theMCUandhowintegralhewillbeinthemassive franchise’s future.

He told Comicbook.com, “It comes down to the cast and with Jonathan Majors, who I think took over the Hall H stage, you know, in the three minutes he was up there. It’s amazing, and I said to him there’s nobody’s shoulders I’d rather be putting the Multiverse Saga on than his. It’s really impressivewhatJonathanMajorsisabletodoand all the different incarnations, variants, if you will,

of Kang that we will see him do. It’s really pretty cool.”

He also spoke about the difference between KangandthelastMarvel“bigbad,”Thanos.“What Iloveisthathe’stotallydifferentfromThanos.That he is completely different. That it’s not just how about there’s a bigger purple guy with a helmet. That’s not what Kang is. Kang is a very different

Jonathan Majors’ Kang the Conqueror to carry MCU

Multiverse Saga on his Shoulders, Studio Chief Says

By TheGrio Staff

type of villain and the fact that he is many, many different characters is what’s most exciting and mostdifferentiates

MajorshimselfspoketoCollideraboutthevarious iterationsofthecharacterhewillgettoexplore.He explained,

think the thing about Kang, even the comic

he contains

much of myself can I explore and share? That’s

that Kang and He Who Remains

theaters

Actors

Rudd (left) and

Majors speak at the

Cinematic

NETFLIX’S TOP EXECUTIVE TEAM in Africa

plans to continue spending on scripted and unscripted content across genres until it unearths the big “Squid Game”-like show that captures global buzz.

Duringthe“SeeWhat’sNextAfrica”showcase in Johannesburg, South Africa, the streamer unveiled several African original renewals, some co-production developments, more details around existing projects, and another multi-project output deal with the South Africa filmmaker MandlakayiseWalterDube for films and series.

Under the partnership, Dube — who directed Netflix’s first commissioned African film “Silverton Siege,” released earlier this year — will direct a varietyofNetflix-ownedprojects.HejoinsNigeria’s JunleAfolayan of KunleAfolayan Productions and Mo Abudu of EbonyLife Studios who have similar output deals with the streamer already.

Netflix said it plans to line up further output deals with moreAfrican filmmakers.

ThestrategyoutofAfrica,sharedexclusivelywith Variety, was refreshing news as streamers begin totightentheir contentspendas global subscriber growthslows.Thatbelt-tighteningwon’thappenin Africa just yet, said NetflixAfrica’s content execs, who are adamant to ramp up the output from the continent and won’t be doing any less.

“Our investment inAfrica continues to grow and we just continue to do more and more shows,” said Dorothy Ghettuba, Netflix’s director of local language series forAfrica. “We believe thatAfrica is one of the major creative centres for great storytelling that resonates around the world, so it onlymakessenseforustoincreaseourinvestment with ourslate, withan even more exciting slate.”

Nkateko Mabaso, Netflix’s director of licensing and co-production for Africa, who recently joined

NetflixAfricaBosses - clockwise: Dorothy Ghettuba, BenAmadasun,Tendeka Matatu, NkatekoMabaso

Netflix Africa Bosses Talk Originals, Co-Production Strategy and Expansion Plans: ‘We Can Only Go Forward and Spend More’ (VARIETY EXCLUSIVE)

By Thinus Ferreira

from pan-African pay-TV operator MultiChoice, said the streamer is constantly expanding the partnersit’sworkingwithacrossthecontinent,and looking to elevate the creative product. “We can onlygoforwardandspendmore,really, and that’s what exciting,” said Mabaso.

On the Dube partnership, Tendeka Matatu, Netflix’s director of local language films forAfrica, said “these kinds of deals with talent — with fantastic filmmakers — we will be doing more of these. This demonstrates our commitment to the local industry and building the industry for the future.”

For co-productions across Africa, however, Mabaso said that funding remains the greatest challenge.

“There’s a lot more support in the SouthAfrican market but if you look at other markets, which are key for us, like Kenya and Nigeria, there are still opportunitiesforotherfunderstocomeinandplay a part in the co-production space,” said Mabaso. “We are continuing to produce our Netflix-owned projects in those markets.”

While South Africa, Nigeria and Kenya remain the three key African content territories for Netflix originals, Ghettuba said the streamer is buying shows from various other countries on the continent, ranging from Ghana and Zimbabwe to Uganda, and will beexpandingits original content umbrella. “Rome wasn’t built in a day, we will be getting there.”

While still anchored in Amsterdam in the Netherlands, the same goes for Netflix’s eventual set-up of a physical head office somewhere in Africa.

“It’s a matter of time, of course,” said Ben Amadasun, Netflix’s director of content for the

Middle East andAfrica. “We don’t have a specific time period but we know we will be having a presence here sooner or later — it’s very much partofour plans,just no timing as yet.”

Ghettuba added that “what works well for Netflix is local specificity.”

“There’sacuriosityacrosstheworldaboutlocallyspecific shows fromAfrica — great creative, great stories,” said Ghettuba. “The world wants to know what’shappening inAfrica”.

According to Matatu, the Netflix team continues to put in time meeting African filmmakers across the continent and building relationships, with Amadasun adding that Netflix — which is in discussions with African governments and countries’ film industries — “is constantly open and [looking at] how to continue our investments in the key markets. We’re always very flexible in how we see our relationships with industry and governments inthese markets.”

Amadasun added: “We’re very ambitious. We have a passion for making sure local stories are told and ensuring there’s a representation of different points of views. We’re really excited about the work that’s coming. We move fast and we have a lot of great titles coming and we have ateamthatcandeliverallofthesegreat storiesto our members inAfrica and around the world.”

Ghetubba said her ambition is “to ensure that the next big ‘Squid Game’-like show comes from Africa.”

“That’s my ambition — a show from Africa that willhavethemomentousimpactthat‘SquidGame’ had on the rest of the world,”said Ghetubba.

Matatu added: “My ambition is simply to make Netflix the home of African film; for audiences

Netflix Africa from page 127

from the continent and globally to come to Netflix to watch those great African movies; and for all ourfantasticfilmmakerstocometoNetflixtomake their bestwork.”

Netflix Africa’s announcements and further content details include:

» “Ludik” (SouthAfrica,series): Its first Afrikaans title releasingAug. 26 starringArnold Vosloo.

» “TheBraveOnes” (SouthAfrica,series): Created by filmmakerAkin Omotoso and produced by Ochre Media,this 6-episode supernatural series releasing Sept. 16 stars Sthandile Nkosi as Ntsiki, a mystical being reincarnated as human outto revenge her sister’s death.

» “HowtoRuinChristmas: TheBaby Shower” (SouthAfrica,series): The third season will release on Dec.16.

» “Young,FamousandAfrica” (pan-Africa, series): The reality series has been renewed for a second season with production starting soon.

» “iNumberNumber:Fool’sGold” (South Africa,film):Asequelfilm,directed by Donovan Marsh andreleased in2023. Starring S’DumoMtshali and Presley Chweneyagae, they are reprisingtheir roles as buddy cops and trying to solvethe biggestgold heistin African history.

» “ElesinOba,TheKing’sHorseman” (Nigeria,film): Based on the play by Wole Soyinka and produced byMoAbudu and starring OdunladeAdekolaand ShaffyBello, the story explores the collision betweenYoruba traditions and British colonialism through the experience of a king’s horseman on themost important day of his life.The filmwill make its world premiere at the upcomingToronto International FilmFestival (TIFF) on Sept. 10 and Netflix on Nov.4.

» “Anikulapo” (Nigeria, film):Amystical folklore drama,directed by KunleAfolayan and starring KunleRemi,itrevolves around the life of Saro,a young zealous man seeking for greener pasturein the great Oyo Kingdom. However, unfolding events andhis illicit affairwith the king’swife,Arolake lead to his untimely death and encounter withAkala,a mystical bird.Releases on Sept.21.

TheBraveOnes

» “KingsofQueenstown” (SouthAfrica, series): From director JahmilXTQuebekathis series starring ZolisaXaluva and releasing Nov. 4,revolvesarounda youngsoccerprodigy who mustdeal with his washed-up pro-footballer father while navigating difficult choices.

» “BloodandWater” (SouthAfrica,series): The thirdseason of this CapeTown set youth drama series will release in November.

Elsewhere,Netflixhasalsolicensed31Nigerian filmswithanewonelaunchingdailyduringAugust. Theseinclude:“TheGhostandtheTout,”“Merry Men: The RealYoruba Demons,” “Elevator Baby,” “The Set Up,” “Love Is War,” “Sugar Rush,” “Up North,” “Nimbe,” “Merry Men 2: Another Mission” and “Coming from Insanity,” among others.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/entertainment/news/ netflix-africa-bosses-talk-originals-co-productionstrategy-and-expansion-plans-we-can-only-goforward-and-spend-more-exclusive/ar-AA10ersN

Image credit: Netflix

Zambian Wins 2022 BBC Komla Dumor Award

By BBC News

ZAMBIAN TV and radio presenter Dingindaba Jonah Buyoya has won the 2022BBC News KomlaDumorAward.

At 25, Buyoya is the youngest recipient of the award, launched in2015,andthefirstoftheseven winners so far from southern Africa.

He is currently a TV host and reporter with Diamond TelevisioninZambia,wherehe startedworkfive years ago.

The award was created to honour Komla Dumor, a presenter for BBC World News, who died suddenly aged 41 in 2014.

Buyoyafollowsinthefootsteps of Victoria Rubadiri, Solomon Serwanjja, Waihiga Mwaura, Amina Yuguda, Didi Akinyelure and Nancy Kacungira.

The runner-up for this year's prize is Ivory Coast's Lindsay Aida Guei, who presents her own talk show on Canal+ Elles, anAfrica-focused TV channel.

The Zambian reporter will spend three months working

withBBCNewsteamsinLondon across TV, radio and online. He will also receive training and be mentored by leading BBC journalists.

As part of the placement, he will travel to a country in Africa to report on a story that will be broadcast to the BBC's global audiences.

"Finding out I'd won the BBC News Komla Dumor Award is one of the best things to have happened in my life," Buyoya says.

"I have a huge admiration for Komla's prodigious work. I've always wanted to be a journalist andI'dwatchbackKomla'snews reports, inspired by his powerful storytelling and his dedication to coveringAfrica authentically.

"I'm truly grateful to be part of Komla's legacy."

The judges praised Buyoya for his journalism, his charisma and his passion for sharing stories about the continent through digital platforms.

"We're looking forward to welcomingBuyoyatoBBCNews. We're excited by his journalistic talent, and seeing him flourish duringhisBBCplacement,"BBC Africa head Juliet Njeri.

"His dedication to ensuring important news stories from Africa are told in a compelling and engaging way, makes him ideal tohelpto continue Komla's legacy - sharing nuanced and comprehensivestoriesaboutthe continent."

Komla Dumor: Face ofAfrica https://www.msn.com/en-us/ news/world/zambian-wins-2022bbc-komla-dumor-award/ar-

Dingindaba Jonah Buyoya is the seventh winner of the award © BBC

Iyanu: Child of Wonder Will Bring Nigerian Culture to the Forefront

By Dana da Silva

IYANU: CHILD OF WONDER, a fantasy coming-of-agestory,hasbeengreenlitbyCartoon Network and HBO Max as a 2D animated series based on the graphic novel of the same name from Dark Horse Comics and YouNeek Studios The graphic novel is authentically African, as it is influencedbyNigerianculture,meaningtheseries willalso draw from this inspiration.

YouNeek Studios is an African-based company that focuses on creating graphicnovels, animated works and video games that are all inspired by African culture, history and mythology. Nigerianborn Roye Okupe is at the helm of this company, with some of his award-winning series being Malika–WarriorQueenandE.X.O.:TheLegend of Wale Williams. Now YouNeek's graphic novel, Iyanu: Child of Wonder, is getting made into an animatedseries.Thelaunchofthisshowisagreat achievement as it will bring more African content

to a global audience who will likely be unfamiliar with thisrich, cultural setting.

Iyanu is a young orphan with no memory of her past, spending her days studying the ancient arts and Yoruba history. One day, she triggers her divine powers, which appear to rival the ancient

Malika-Warrior Queen E.X.O.-Legend of Wale Williams

Iyanu: Child

of Wonder

YOUNEEK

deities of her people. She and others then begin a journey to uncover the truth about evil lurking in their city. Her abilities will ultimately bring the world back from the brink of destruction from TheCorrupt,whicharecursedwildlifeanddivine beasts. This will lead her down a path where she willdiscoverwhathappenedto herandherfamily, leading tothe reveal of her ultimate destiny.

This is a superhero story heavily influenced by the Yoruba people of Nigeria, including Nigerian culture, music and mythology. Okupe mentions that everything in the initial graphic novel -- the costumes, politics, architecture and names -are all inspired by the Yoruba culture. Yoruba is one of three major tribes in Nigeria, which is also where Okupe was born and raised, making it an even more authentic representation. In a video announcing the initial launch of the graphic novel, Okupe spoke about how there is currently a demand for content that features African culture, and how this need is grossly under-served, which thisnew animated serieswillhelp to address.

Okupe will write and direct multiple episodes, meaning fans of this project will find that it will feature the same kind of fantastical elements

found in the graphic novel. This series is part of a recent resurgence of African content, which includes Super Sema, an animated project on which Black Panther star Lupita Nyong'o has partnered. Even though it is targeted toward a younger audience, it has incredible world-building and a strong independent young woman at its center that will call home to many fantasy fans. The series is ultimately for anyone who enjoys settings that arerich in myth,magic and lore.

Iyanu: Child of Wonder has all the elements that make for a great fantasy series. With it being so heavily influenced by Nigerian culture, this will also help generate a greater appreciation for African content. Further information has not been provided for the project, and a release date has notbeenannounced.WhilefansofOkupe'sworks will have to wait for additional announcements, there is plenty of content online, including issues of Iyanu: Child of Wonder, to get prepared for its eventual release.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/entertainment/news/ iyanu-child-of-wonder-will-bring-nigerian-culture-tothe-forefront/ar-AA10nOeK

Image

Lifestyle and Culture

Emefa Cole Appointed Inaugural Curator of Jewelry, Diaspora, at V&A

By Tianwei Zhang

THE LONDON-BASED Ghanaian jewelry

designer Emefa Cole has been named the inauguralcuratorofJewelry,Diaspora,supported by Elizabeth Gage at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

In her new role, Cole will lead the “acquisition, documentation, research, presentation and interpretation of the V&A’s jewelry collection with a distinct focus on diaspora,” the cultural institute said,addingthatshewillworkcloselywithChristine Checinska, senior curator, Africa, and Diaspora, and her team to manifest a new vision for the Victoria and AlbertMuseum’s jewelry collection.

The museum –– which owns one of the most comprehensive jewelry collections in the world with highlights including jeweled pendants given by Elizabeth I to her courtiers, diamonds worn by CatherinetheGreatofRussia,andQueenVictoria’s sapphire and diamond coronet — acknowledged that the diaspora “area of its collections needs to be expanded.”

A London Metropolitan University alumni, Cole is known for aligning her design ethos with theoriginofsourcematerials,asshecombinesher Ghanaian heritage and natural forces-inspiration intopiecesusingsingle-mineorigingoldfromWest Africa, as well as upcycled silver and diamonds.

OneofhersculpturalringsfromtheVulcanseries was added to the Victoria and Albert Museum’s permanent collection in November 2019, and was later featured on the BBC 2 series “Secrets of the Museum.” The piece is now on display in the William and Judith Bollinger Gallery.

“I’m looking forward to working alongside the most incredible team of curators, including Clare Phillips, who discovered my work.…This is an opportunity to add to the existing collection

throughmylensasamaker,forwhichI’mhonored.

The impact of this role on my own practice will be invaluable,” Cole said.

James Robinson, keeper of decorative art and sculpture at the V&A, added that her appointment represented“ahugeadvanceforusinourconstant interrogation of the collections to ensure that they retain relevance for our diverse audiences while adhering to the standards of excellence for which the museum is justlyfamous.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/lifestylebuzz/emefa-cole-appointed-inaugural-curator-ofjewelry-diaspora-at-v-a/ar-AA11gOHE?

Source: https://wwd.com/accessories-news/ jewelry/emefa-cole-inaugural-curator-of-jewelrydiaspora-victoria-albert-museum-1235306877/

EmefaColeAppointed Inaugural Curator of Jewelry, Diaspora, at V&A © Courtesy

Soul Cap, a Swimming Cap Designed for Black Hair, Approved after Ban from the Olympics

By Marina Pitofsky, USA

ASWIMMINGCAPdesignedforBlackswimmers’ hairhasbeenapprovedforcompetitiveracesafter it wasbanned from the Tokyo Olympics lastyear.

The International Swimming Federation, or FINA, on Friday said the “Soul Cap”is on its list of approved equipment.

“Promotingdiversityandinclusivityisattheheart of FINA’s work,” executive director Brent Nowicki said in a statement, “and it is very important that all aquatic athleteshave accesstothe appropriate swimwear.”

BritishbrandSoulCap,whichsellstheswimming cap that can "fit people with braids, locs or afro hair," according to its website, applauded the decision,callingit“asuccessthataffectstheentire swimming community.”

“Wewanttothankallofyouintheswimcommunity for comingtogethertoshare yourvoices and raise awareness about accessibility and inclusion in the sport,” the company saidin a statement.

SoulCapexplainedthatitsubmittedtheswimming capforapprovalaheadoftheTokyoOlympics,but its application wasrejected.

“For a long time, conventional swim caps have beenanobstacleforswimmerswith thick,curly,or volume-blessed hair. They can’t always find a cap that fits their hair type, and that often means that

swimmersfromsomebackgroundsendupavoiding competitions, or giving up the sport entirely,” the company said.

Alice Dearing, the first Black female swimmer to represent Britain at the Olympics was refused permissiontowearaSoulCapforthe10-kilometer marathon swim at the Tokyo Olympics.

She saidin an opinion piecein the Guardianlast week that she is “relieved and excited to hear that Fina has now overturned its original decision.”

“Having the option to wear a swim cap that properly fits gives people the chance to feel confident when going swimming, and reduces the potential for stressful moments in the changing roomsor poolside,” she wrote.

“Crucially, the caps embrace all hairstyles, from afros, locs, braids and curls to wavy and straight hairasbeingappropriatehairstylestoswimin,and by implication, they challenge a narrow view of whataswimmerofanystandard‘should’looklike,” she added.

Alice Dearing of Britain exits the water after finishing thewomen’smarathonswimmingeventattheSummer Games in Tokyo. (David Goldman/AP)

Bicycle Nomad and Others Recreate 1,900-Mile Ride of Buffalo Soldier Bicycle Corps

By TheGrio Staff

In this archivephoto, members of the Buffalo Soldier Corps of the 25th Infantry pose at MinervaTerrace, MammothHot Springs,Yellowstone National Park.TheYellowstone trip was one of several that the Soldier Corps took before embarking on the 1,900-milejourney to Missouri. (Photo by F. Jay Haynes, 1896. Montana Historical Society Research Center, Haynes Foundation Photograph Collection, H-3614.)

ERICK CEDEÑO RECEIVED a hero’s welcome when he rodehis bicycleinto the front drive ofthe Missouri History Museum after a 1,900-mile, 41day odyssey.

The 48-year-old, known as @bicycle_nomad on Instagram, had completed an epic feat in honor of another epic feat achieved exactly 125 years before,the St. Louis Post-Dispatch is reporting.

Cedeño was among scores of reenactors and historians who embarked on the cross-country trek from Montana to Missouri, sticking as closely as possible to the route of their predecessors, the Post-Dispatch reportedlast week. Their predecessors — 20 Black U.S. Army

soldiers known as the Buffalo Soldier Bicycle Corps of the 25th Infantry — set out on “The Great Experiment” on bicycles donated by Spalding Co. in a heavy rainstorm on June 14, 1897. It was a 1,900-mile journey that ended 45 days later on July 24, 1897, in Forest Park, the siteofthehistorymuseum.Cedeño’sridewasfour days shorter.

“It’s so epic, what they did,” Cedeño said to the peoplegatheredatthemuseum.“I’msoemotional because it was such a hard trip. It’s almost superhuman what those guys accomplished.”

BuffaloSoldiers from page 134

According to the report in last week’s PostDispatch, theArmy’s experiment was to ascertain whether crossing the country would be easier by bicycle rather than by horse. The Buffalo Soldiers — so named depending on who’s telling the story for their dark, curly hair or fighting style — faced harsh conditions.

They walked their32-pound bikes through thick, gumbo-like mud as well as across mountains and on sandhills. They forded rivers and streams. Mosquitoes and bad water were also problems. Further, they encountered racism, which was greater in Missouri.

Bobby McDonald of Anaheim, California, the Post-Dispatch reported, is one of the main organizers of events commemorating the bicycle trek. His father and four uncles were Buffalo SoldiersduringWorldWarII.HeservedintheNavy during Vietnam and has a replica Iron Riders (a nickname of the soldiers) uniform and bicycle.

HebikedfivemilesinJuneinMissoula,Montana, with 40 other reenactors and reports that it stopped raining about 10 minutes before their departure. “There were no roads,” back then, he said.“Itrained,itsnowed,itsleeted—allthatstuff on them. Sometimes when they rode on railroad

This is the lively story of the only bicycle corps the U.S. Army ever authorized. Using buffalo soldiers, this1890sAfricanAmerican unit conducted drills and exercises on wheels. They rodeintoNorthern Montana on muddy trails and toured Yellowstone on their 100-pound iron bicycles. As proof of their capabilities, these Iron Riders pedaled 1,900 miles from Ft. Missoula, across the snow-dusted Rocky Mountains and steamy Great Plains, to St. Louis.As theyapproachedthecityover1,000civilianbicyclists rode out to escort them into town in a great parade. Learn more about the adventures of this little known buffalo soldier unit and fascinating details about this era in America. Well researched and a good read. Full of rare pictures and drawings.

https://www.amazon.com/Iron-Riders-Missoula-BuffaloSoldier/dp/1575100746

Matt Lautzenheiser, the executive director of the Historical Museum at Fort Missoula, a marathoner and a reenactor, told the PostDispatchthatthestoryofthe Buffalo Soldiers is one that should definitely be told.

https://thegrio. com/2022/07/25/bicyclenomad-and-others-recreate1900-mile-ride-of-buffalosoldier-bicycle-corps

Image credit: ironridersdallascyclingclub. com

tracks,therewasnobottom, orrocksorgraveltotakethe absorption.”

J

African Diaspora Independence Days

J 26, 1960

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 ETHIOPIAM 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

R

R

DJIBOUTI - J 27,1977

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R

SEYCHELLES - J 29,1976 D R CONGO (KINSHASA) - J 30, 1960 MOROCCO (I ) - J 30, 1969 J

R

BURUNDI - J 1, 1962

RWANDA - J 1, 1962 D R

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

THE BAHAMAS - J 10, 1973

R SÃO TOMÉ AND

PRINCIPE - J 12, 1975

LIBERIA - J 26, 1847 A

BENIN - A . 1, 1960

NIGER - A . 3,1960

D R BURKINA

FASO - A . 5,1960

JAMAICA - A 06, 1962

CÔTE D'IVOIRE (I C )A . 7, 1960

CHAD - A . 11,1960

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC - A . 13, 1960

CONGO (BRAZZAVILLE)A . 15, 1960

GABON - A . 16, 1960

TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO - A 31, 1962

SWAZILAND - S .6, 1968

S C ST. KITTS

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AND BARBUDA -

- N 03, 1978

- N .11, 1975

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30,

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.

- D . 9,1961

. 12,1963

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